Male Is As Male Does
by Phoenix13
Summary: 2009 MOVIEVERSE Lennox discovers the duties that being a 'Prime' involves when he stumbles across one of Optimus Prime's private moments. Ch 18 - Ironhide explodes over being told to keep his hands off anything female. Bumblebee protects Mikaela.
1. Chapter 1

**Male Is As Male Does**

**Authors Note:** Blame the new 2009 movie and _optimus prime 007_ for this! I read her new fic, put movie!Arcee and Optimus Prime together in my head... and just look at the result. Warnings for swear words and 2009 movie spoilers in this. This is just a little thing I knocked up, fuelled by seeing the movie. Ain't it awesome?

Lennox waited patiently in the hangar the Autobots used as their own personal quarters at the NEST base. They had two hangers, one for business used jointly with the human members of NEST, and one for personal use when the bots felt they needed 'time out' from their human allies. Lennox shifted his weight from one hip leaning on the bench to another, his arms folded across his chest, his fingers tapping impatiently on his upper arms. His eyes restlessly scanned the hangar, taking note of what the other Autobots were doing.

The Twins were mercifully absent, off on a mission in another country. Lennox winced. He'd found them funny at first, and then the irritation had set in. Bumblebee obviously felt it as well since the last time he was here, the silent bot had taken them in one hand each, carried them out to the beach not far from the hangar, and dropped them in the sea. With no apologies.

By the time they'd come back – with water and sand dripping down their chassis – they'd been swearing at Bee, calling him a 'mother-fucking, dipstick, joy-killing, loser hard-ass with no jive', and 'an Optimus-wannabe'. Then it had been a growling Optimus' turn to carry the mischievous bots to the beach, except he didn't drop them in the water, he threw them. Hard. The trash talking Twins had screamed like girls. That was Prime taking out the trash.

Lennox's eyes roamed the room again. Ironhide was seated at a bench across from him, tinkering with his cannons while keeping one craggy optic on his friend. Sunlight streamed in through the opaque windows just below the roof. It glinted off the Autobot's scratched armor.

"He said he'd be back soon?"

The black mech raised his head slightly, considering his words. What Prime was doing theoretically shouldn't take _that_ long. Even if Optimus was in a mood to draw it out. "Yes."

Across the room, Ratchet snickered, shaking his head.

Ironhide slide his gaze to the medic, "Shut it, Ratch."

Ratchet made a sound suspiciously like a fart, then fell silent. Then another round of snickers from the Hummer. Lennox raised his eyebrows. Something was up. His analytical battle-tuned brain turned over. Right, who else wasn't here? Sideswipe. Nuh uh, that sexy dangerous silver mech was off impressing some of the higher-up Army bad aft's with his moves. He'd passed him on the way in.

Arcee? The triplet of femmes?

Hmmm.

"Ironhide? Where's Arcee?" Lennox inquired.

"...."

"Where?" Lennox prompted again.

Ironhide couldn't tell a lie. And dammit, if Optimus insisted on his current actions, he wasn't going to cover up for him any more. Their Prime may have been exercising his 'Prime' rights, and as their Leader of course he had every right to do so, but hell, couldn't he find a better place or time to do it?

His CPU made up, Ironhide smirked openly, "She's with him."

The human soldier arched an eyebrow. Arcee? With Optimus? That was strange, he really hadn't thought the two of them; no, wait; the THREE of them – or was that four? - had gotten along. Hardly a word or glance ever passed between the massive Commander and the sexy trio of femmes. While the humans had thought the only female Autobot in the group would receive just about every virile male Autobots attention in bucket loads, the reverse had been the case. All of the males acted as if she didn't exist. Sideswipe never made a move. Bumblebee acted as if she wasn't there. Ratchet talked _about _her but not _to_ her doing her medical physical. Even the hyperactive Twins barely had a rude word to say to her. She was persona non grata. Or Autobot non grata...

Lennox's attention was drawn to the rear of the hanger when a loud, 'big robot' sounding thump followed by a long groan echoed around the building.

The man snapped his gaze back to the bulky Ironhide. Suspicious. That groan sounded like their very own illustrious flame-patterned Commander. Ironhide's expression made it appear as if he'd swallowed something indigestible. Oh yeah, something was up.

Lennox stood thinking.

Then another groan sounded out, and following on its aft was a high-pitched yelp. Lennox knew where Prime's room was, in the middle of the group of barricaded 'rooms' assigned to all the bots as private space. He'd seen him coming out of it a few times. And damn, while those noises sounded like Optimus, they also appeared to be coming from the direction of his room.

Lennox frowned. Did robots...?

Nah.

Another groan. A series of yelps. A deep chuckle of the type that ONLY Prime did.

Wait. Hadn't the debriefing after the Egypt battle talked about Prime having brothers, and ancestry and 'the future of Autobot sparklings'? That they had some sort of family relations? If all that was correct, they must have a way of -

Lennox smacked a hand over his face. Oh God.

His comlink earpiece crackled, "Lennox, the President is waiting. What is Optimus Prime's response? Hurry it up, would you?". The voice of his own General sounded in his ear. Geez. The mother-loving President. With a sigh and a roll of his muscled shoulders, he took hard strides across the hangar to Prime's private room. He heard Ratchet begin to say something, heard Ironhide's abrupt response to shut him down. He ignored both of them.

Reaching the giant door, he firmed up his shoulders again (cripes, he wouldn't be needing any extra weights in the gym today the way he was going) and rapped in a no-nonsense fashion on Prime's intimidating door.

"Optimus, it's Lennox. I need to ask you something for the President."

Used to the deep but loud digital tones of the Autobots, his own voice sounded pathetic in comparison.

He heard two heavy Optimus Prime feet hit the floor.

_In bed_? Lennox thought amused. Then his brain failed. _Oh hell, Ironhide said Arcee was with him_!

The door opened. Optimus Prime stood there in all his familiar-but-still-awesome glory. Lennox eyed him from his position at his ankles. He knew some of Prime's armor had changed since the Egypt battle, but hadn't the robot had MORE armor not LESS? Optimus looked strangely... in a word or two.. somewhat naked.

"Yes?" Intense blue optics stared down at him patiently.

Lennox squinted back at him, "The President wants to know what your answer is to the question he asked last night. Yes or no?"

Optimus shifted his stature minutely, and then Lennox saw it. On the huge slab of padded metal the robots used as beds, two of the Arcee femmes were reclining on it in what could only be described as 'come hither' poses. Not that Lennox was any sort of prude.

The man snapped his eyes back to Prime's face. Yowza. There was no need to guess what was going down between the big Leader and his, gulp, opposite sex underlings.

"Tell him I agree with his proposal."

"Yes Sir. Sorry for disturbing you like this."

Lennox turned to go, but his eyes caught the flash of a piece of armor on Optimus that was a different color from red or blue on his lower mid-section, and _moving_. Just as Optimus closed the door, he realised what he'd been looking at. The third Arcee robot had been caressing Optimus from behind, hiding herself from his direct line of sight while letting her fingers wander just above his crotch region.

His eyes widened. His feet ground to a halt. Missing armor. Three females in the room. Touching the huge male robot THERE. Oh _fuck_. Was he the first human to witness alien robot mating behaviour?!

Seeing his expression, Ratchet and Ironhide broke into raucous barking laughter.

"A Prime has many duties, Lennox, and you've seen just about all of them now..." Ironhide rumbled with a smirk. "Get used to it."


	2. Chapter 2

**Male Is As Male Does**

Authors Note: Yes, I know, the first chapter was supposed to be a oneshot. Sorry. Couldn't help myself, I'm having too much fun playing around with Prime's private life! And so are all the reviewers! Thanks guys!

**Chapter 2**

Major Lennox was muttering to himself at the mess hall table when Epps loped past. The heavily muscled soldier paused in his steps. Stopped. Turned. And walked right back to his superior officer. His head lowered to be level with Will's.

"You alright?"

Lennox didn't raise his head from his precious coffee cup, but his eyes lifted to stare at Epps's curious face. The cup was set down onto the table. A sigh came past his lips.

"Yeah... I think. Sort of. I just... saw something," Lennox's eyes dropped to the table top, "something... disturbing."

Keeping the rest of his face neutral (he'd heard and seen a heck of a lot of surprises and nasty shit in his lifetime) Epps lifted one eyebrow as his only expression of 'yeah?' and carefully took a chair at the table. "Define 'disturbing'. You know who we live with."

Lennox broke into muffled laughter. "Oh yeah, and I know 'how' they live with themselves too. Do I ever..."

Epps was now looking at Lennox like someone (Ironhide? That bad bot wasn't immune to jokes) had stuck a KICK ME note to his forehead. "Alright, lemme guess something here. You saw the 'bots doing something that they shouldn't be doing." Epps tried hard to think of things that the Autobots _shouldn't_ be doing. Throwing darts at pictures of the President? Reversing over base personnel and saying 'Oops, that's the third one this week'? Ironhide using staff cars in the car park for target practise and protesting that it was okay because they weren't alive? Bumblebee pulling his famous trick and lubricating on someone?

This time it was Lennox who gave Epps the critical once over. "Nope, I think Optimus had every right to do what he was doing. I just don't think I should've been standing there to witness it."

_Okay, now I've got some intel to go on_, Epps thought. "This involves the big guy," he said carefully.

Lennox snorted, sitting up to lean back in his chair, one of his hands scratching at the top of his head, "Oh yeah, and I'm sure Arcee – all three of her – appreciated how big he is."

That statement stopped Epps cold. He was smart. He really was. Arcee was a female robot. Optimus was a male robot, a VERY male robot. The malest of the Autobots. Heck, even the female human staff of NEST thought he was the hottest thing ever - making the human men of NEST want to let down his tyres out of spite. All of them looked crap standing next to HIM.

"Oh... _shit_." Epps's hand reached out across the table, swiped Lennox's coffee, and chucked the semi-warm liquid down his throat. Swallowing the last of the coffee, Epps met his Commander's eyes, "Do we have to issue condoms to them now? Because, you know, we don't have banana's big enough to demonstrate on. No, stuff that, we don't HAVE big enough condoms for their species to use, and I ain't sewing the small ones together. No way."

Collapsing into feeble laughter, Lennox covered his face with his hands, rubbing at his eyes, "Oh my God."

Epps glanced around the mess hall. It was between meal times, hence it was empty. Thankfully. He beckoned towards Lennox to 'bring it on', "So tell me, what did you see? Or is this going in the 'classified only' file?"

Feeling a lot more relaxed now that he was sharing what he had seen with one of his best buddies, Lennox sighed and leaned his forearms on the table. "I hate to give you the wrong impression, but I didn't see him and Arcee doing the, ah, whatever they do, but she was in his room on his bed-"

"Berth," Epps corrected automatically. He was the technical sergeant.

"Berth, bed, whatever, don't interrupt," Will waved one hand around to shush him, "he was there too, and Optimus was making sounds like he was one very happy Autobot. Like a bad porn DVD, you get me?"

Both of Epps's eyebrows raised up. This was interesting.

"I was waiting in their hanger to talk to Optimus - had to ask him a question – and all these 'happy' noises were coming from his room. Ratchet and Ironhide didn't seem the least bit upset by it. The General told me to get an answer to the President's question, so..." Lennox paused to cringe, "I knocked on Prime's door. When it opened I saw two Arcee's on his bed – _berth_, sorry – and the third one was standing behind him and groping around just above Prime's, uh," the hardened soldier winced, "crotch."

On reflex Epps jerked up the coffee cup for solace. Damn it. Empty. Abandoning the cup he shook his head. "You know, they haven't really allowed us to do a lot of research on them, we don't know what they do for sex. They could plug themselves together with extension cords, or swap memory sticks, you know?"

Will stared back at him with a 'like hell' expression, "If they did that, why was Arcee intent on touching him close to 'down there'?"

"Good point." Epps's fingers clenched around the coffee cup. "You know the best thing?"

"No... there's a best bit to this?"

"This means Optimus isn't gay."

Lennox almost brought up the coffee he'd drunk all over the table. He forced down the bile that had risen in his throat. He was used to the alien robots that had landed on their planet. The Autobots were good friends. Good soldiers. Good companions. He'd never had pause to think about what they MIGHT be doing in their own downtime; personal downtime. He'd never caught them playing frisbee or sunbathing on the beach, so... adults of any species had needs. He supposed the Autobots did too. Or at least, Prime did. He hadn't ever caught Ironhide near Arcee, and he knew 'Hide well enough to know the older Autobot sometimes made very crude suggestions concerning females.

Epps continued on, "And another thing..."

Will became distrustful of what his soldier was thinking. Epps was the best, he really was, but he also had a very imaginative mind.

"Knowing how big Optimus Prime is; from a height point-of-view; and on evidence, considering that they may reproduce something like us, how damn big is his equipment?"

Lennox dropped his head down onto the table with a THUNK, whining softly and covering his ears with his hands. "Nooo... make it go away..."

"We could ask Bumblebee. He's the most friendly, I reckon we'd get some hard answers from him if we pressed him firmly enough," Epps suggested thoughtfully.

"...don't think Bumblebee has seen Prime naked..." Lennox mumbled tonelessly.

"What about asking Sam?"

This time Will lifted his head. He looked tired. "Ask him what? Hey Sam, nice to see you again and all, but have you ever seen Prime humping anything and what does he look like without armor?" He grimaced. "No. Just – no. And this stays between us, all right? No sharing this one with the other guys or NEST staff. Christ, if the scientists knew what we know now, they'd have poor Prime strapped to a bench and stripped for a good poke and a giggle. THAT I do NOT want to deal with, thank you very much." Lennox pointed a finger at Epps, "and the men of the world do not need to know how many inches Optimus has!"

Epps grunted. There was silence between the two. It didn't last long.

"Ask Ratchet? He's the uh, what did they call him, CMO, some type of doctor. We could ask him what they do for sex from a technical perspective. They use the internet, they must know what we do. They can return the favor."

Will's face shifted into soldier mode, "No, we don't do anything about this unless it becomes an issue on the battlefield. We see Prime trying to do it during a skirmish, _then_ it becomes an issue, not before. If he can't keep his hands to himself that's when it threatens everyone's safety. Understood?"

"Yes sir," Epps began to smile, then his eyes widened. His mouth flopped open. "Ugh..."

Lennox jerked around in his chair to look at what Epps was seeing.

Arcee – one of them, at least – was walking in the hangar's oversized doorway. She was wet. Very wet. Sand covered her feet and ankles. Her optics brightened when she caught sight of the two human men. Her head nodded a greeting, "Lennox, Epps."

Epps gulped, "Hi..."

"Arcee," Lennox peered at her and the amount of water dripping from her purple physique. "Had a swim?"

"Yes. I enjoyed it. Water is rare back home."

With another smile, the femme walked past, followed by her other two selves. All of them wet, with sand in various places. The appearance of the majestic Optimus Prime striding along behind the last Arcee triplet made both soldiers sit up straight in their chairs. Optimus was also wet and suspiciously sandy. The big Prime appeared relaxed and pleased with himself, the chrome parts of his body glittering... similar stricken thoughts of what the big mech and sexy femme may have been doing on the deserted beach coastline _together_ scrolled through each human man's mind.

Optimus halted momentarily next to the men.

"Major Lennox. Epps. Enjoying your break?"

"Y-yeah," Lennox stuttered, eyes wide.

Epps didn't trust himself to speak. He settled with a very slow nod.

Prime's optics brightened and his mouthplates lifted minutely in his version of a smile, "Good." He followed after Arcee, intent on washing the sand off his immense chassis. They watched him go.

"Lennox..."

Lennox kept staring after the big guy, trying to imagine what robots looked like when they did 'it'. It must be noisy, they were made of metal after all.

"Lennox!"

And if they were doing 'it' on the beach, that was a breach of security! They had to stop them! Even aliens must have a sense of decorum. Unless their lower body parts were under the waterline, then that was technically okay -

"WILL!"

Lennox returned his attention to his human soldier, exclaiming, "What?!"

Epps leaned closer to his friend to say softly and clearly, "Prime had the imprints of two femme sized hands in the sand covering his butt. Looks like a femme grabbed onto his butt from in front." Epps held out his hands to demonstrate. "Like this?"

Lennox slammed his head down onto the table and began to cry.


	3. Chapter 3

**Man Is As Man Does**

**Authors Note: **Thanks everyone for the reviews, alerts and favourites. I'll keep this going as long as my smutty brain keeps coughing it up. There is a bit of an awkward moment at the end, I can't warn you what it is, but if you don't believe in robot sexuality, you may be offended, so please don't read! Ta!

**Chapter 3**

Will Lennox was a man who paid almost analytical attention to his surroundings.

Now that he and Epps had some sort of idea what the male Autobots and lone _female_ Autobot did with their spare time, the Major paid even more attention than usual to the huge alien Commander.

It was sign of how well the Autobots knew to hide their personal Autobot relationships that it was several weeks later before Lennox finally saw something between Optimus and Arcee. He had stayed well away from the Autobots private hangar, not wanting to see or hear any more lovey-dovey groaning and grunting coming from Prime's room...

Prime had a personality that was authoritative, courteous and considerate (when he wasn't actively pissed at someone or something – growling, looming, and glaring while his weapons systems came online but stayed sheathed). He was extraordinarily patient with the members of the American Government who thought they knew best when it came to dealing with Decepticons. From what Will had been told, Optimus Prime was thousands of years old. If Optimus was frustrated with the fact that men of a mere fifty-years-of-age could attempt to tell him how they knew best with war tactics - when Optimus had been dealing with such matters since before humans had been invented - he rarely showed more than a dissatisfied metallic frown.

But when a Government official (Galloway's replacement, no less) saw fit to attempt to order Arcee around without checking with Prime first, Optimus completely bypassed diplomatic words and used his full size, height, and intimidation factor to make the man back-off. The growl rumbling through Optimus' wide chest was the clincher which sent the guy stumbling out of the hangar while he tugged nervously at his too-tight neck tie.

Standing off to the side with a demure expression on the sharp angles of her face, Arcee (all three of her) had watched her Leader send the human packing. She exchanged an inquisitive look with Optimus. The big mech looked back at her passively. Then he surprised Lennox by raising one hand and trailing a gentle lone finger down the side of Arcee's cheek with affection. The femme had tilted her head into his touch. Will could've sworn she'd been purring but a noisy helicopter landing outside had killed any chance he had of hearing it.

The moment was over quickly, leaving Lennox standing at his computer station with raised eyebrows, an important Government paper sitting limp in his hands and forgotten. He updated Epps with this 'development' on their next break in the mess hall.

"You-know-who touched the cheek of our lady specialist," Lennox said quietly around bites of his chicken and avocado sandwich, not using names because of other soldiers around them.

Epps slanted a look at his friend over his bowl of beef curry. "Is that all?"

"Whaddya mean, 'is that all'," Lennox snorted, "he touched her. In a possessive kinda way. Like a, 'me king, female mine' display. It's the most I've seen them do to each other since you spotted her handprints all over his rear end."

Epps wasn't too excited. He stirred his cooling curry. "Did they say anything to each other?"

"Nope. Not a word. Not out loud, anyway. Could've been using their internal communicators."

"Huh. He's acting more like her protector than her lover. If one of those assholes in suits tried to order around a female member of my team without my say so, I'd give them what for too."

Will kept his mouth closed so sandwich wasn't ejected over the table when Epps said 'lover'. He still had trouble thinking of Optimus Prime tangled up with a femme for sexual purposes, especially when they had subjected him to their 'noises'. For him, it was like thinking of his parents getting jiggy with it.

Swallowing, he stared shrewdly at Epps. "We're still trying to establish if they can do that. We're still on a fact finding mission here."

Epps shovelled a load of curry into his mouth and chewed it thoughtfully. "I still say we should ask the 'Doc about it."

"No." Will shook his head. "We can't. That's against protocol."

There was grunt of derision from his friend, "Yeah, robots doing the nasty with each other is against protocol too."

Will growled, "Shaddup."

_**One week later...**_

Standing at one of NEST's communication terminals, Major Lennox rubbed at his forehead tiredly, "Repeat, please?"

"_Ironhide and the Twins are staying behind to track the remaining signal. Optimus and Arcee are coming back with us. He has sustained some minor damage and needs a repair." _

There was an unaccustomed moment of silence while Lennox stood motionless and digested that.

"Just Optimus and Arcee?"

The mission leader gave his affirmative, "_Yes Sir." _

Will raised his eyes to stare at the dark ceiling of the hangar. Oh boy. The big bot and his femme (or _femmes_; hell, why didn't he refer to them as Prime's harem and be done with it?) all alone in the back of that mostly-empty plane... no soldiers except the pilots. Just the two bots. With several hours of flight time to kill. He hoped to God the door between the pilots and the bots in the rear stayed shut.

Hmm. Maybe he should warn them...?

Nah.

He smiled to himself. Prime's possible deviant behaviour wasn't his direct responsibility. He'd pass that to the next Major up the Government line. And why on earth couldn't Arcee throw up her hands and say she had a headache?

"Make sure you strap'em down tight, Sergeant. REAL tight. Extra tight. We don't want Optimus getting more hurt than he already is if you hit turbulence. You hear me?"

"_Yes Sir." _

Lennox cut the comlink. Geez. Maybe if the Autobots were tied down hard enough in their vehicle forms, they wouldn't get any ideas. He walked away from his station towards the tarmac outside, muttering forlornly, "I hope Optimus isn't into bondage as well...". Will slapped a hand to his face, "And I really have to get my mind off this _subject_!"

Graham; a sergeant for one of Lennox's co-teams; straightened up from the armored boxes he was helping to unpack and watched his friend walking haphazardly across the tarmac, occasionally muttering "No!" and smacking himself in the side of the head. Graham took a deep breath and turned to his fellow soldiers, using his clipped English accent to good effect, "Boys, don't get too closely involved with the 'bots, alright? Too many mental health days involved."

Several hours later, Ratchet, Lennox and other base personnel were waiting on the tarmac for Prime and Arcee's plane to land. Lennox was in no doubt that Ratchet had already been in contact with his Leader, assessing the situation and what type of repairs were needed. The Major had been half-tempted to ask the CMO some probing questions about Prime's 'duties' but the thought of protocol and other soldiers listening in had kept his mouth in check. Just. Several times he had turned his body, opened his mouth, looked up at Ratchet – froze - then returned to his original posture facing forwards, cringing. Nope.

The screaming roar of the massive plane's engines drowned out everything else as it landed. Lennox could feel the sweat building up in his armpits and groin. Man. He couldn't bear this. What was going to happen when the pilots lowered the rear ramp? At least this time the bots hadn't been near sand or water, so there wouldn't be incriminating evidence of Arcee's hands anywhere on Prime's huge body. In fact, he wasn't sure what to look for or recognise to tell if the mech and femme had been amorous at all.

That thought made him feel a little calmer. His face relaxed. He unclenched his hands from a death grip behind his back. As long as Optimus and Arcee weren't actually rolling around on the floor of the plane in mid-copulation when the ramp lowered, there was nothing for him to worry about.

The plane halted and powered down its multiple engines. The ramp began its descent. Will could clearly see Optimus tied down in his vehicle form at the top of the ramp. Good. Soldiers moved forward to help remove the netting and tie-down ropes keeping the Autobots secure. Lennox watched it all with a critical eye. That netting didn't look all that well secured. He knew his men better than that. In fact, the job looked downright sloppy. Hmmm...

Optimus Prime came down the ramp first, moving slowly with Ratchet next to him, watching it all. He appeared dented, and some of his armor was black, but otherwise he was okay. Lennox knew that for every blemish on Prime's armor, a Decepticon life had been terminated. The three Arcee motorcycles came down in close formation after him, following on Prime's tail into the hangar.

"Look after him, Ratchet."

The medic responded calmly, "Do I ever do anything else?"

Lennox nodded and pursed his lips. So far so good. Everything appeared normal. Turning to follow Prime into the hangar, he paused. Looked back at the interior of the plane over his shoulder. Maybe it wouldn't hurt to take a quick look around. The other soldiers ignored him as he strode up the ramp.

Will stood in the cavernous plane cargo bay. He was looking for anything incriminating; red and blue paint scrapes on the walls, ropes or netting that had been cut off by Prime's bitch-please-armblade, furrows in the walls made by lust-filled metal fingers clenched in ecstasy.... nothing. He nodded his head slowly, feeling pleased that there wasn't anything he could see that screamed 'robot sex'.

Not looking down at his feet, Will's foot slipped on the rubber-lined floor. Quick reflexes and windmill arms kept him from falling on his behind.

"What the...?"

He frowned at the wet patch then wiped his wet foot off on a dry piece of matting. It was sticky, was in one spot only – he couldn't see it anywhere else on the floor- and its volume was twice as big as his head. It wasn't water. Nor was it robot 'blood', since it wasn't glowing blue. He crouched down on one knee, careful to not touch it. His next thought was oil. He wafted some of its fumes towards his nose. Nope. Didn't smell like any oil he knew. This stuff smelt sickly sweet. If anything, he would've labelled it musky. Narrowing his eyes and leaning his head to one side so the overhead lights could illuminate it better, Lennox frowned. The liquid was faintly murky, with silver particles floating in it. He'd seen stuff like this before... only.... it came out of humans; male humans; and didn't make such a big puddle.

Lennox's brain was screaming at him, trying to tell him what it was. The innocent half of him tried to swat it back into the forbidden parts of his brain, but it wouldn't stay quiet.

Optimus and Arcee had untangled the netting. And the straps. Then put them back as best they could over each other. This stuff was... holy God...

No.

He snatched up his wet boot-clad foot and stared at it. Horrified.

No!

He'd _touched_ it! _Smelled_ it!

It _couldn't_ be!

NO WAY!!

Lennox threw his head back and wailed at the top of his lungs, "OPTIMUS..!!!"

**Authors Note:** Yes it is what you think. Maybe I better start putting this fic up in the 'M' section. I guess robots don't carry tissues. If you really don't have a clue what is on the floor, um, nevermind.


	4. Chapter 4

**Male Is As Male Does**

**Authors Note: **I've been slaving over this chapter for a week! I hope it works! Thanks for the reviews and alerts. I appreciate it.

**Chapter 4**

"OPTIMUS~!!

Lennox's anguished cry echoed around the hangar. Ratchet paused briefly in helping his injured Leader undergo a painful transformation sequence. Shaking his head at the human's vocalisation, his guiding hands followed the Autobot Commanders midsection and hip, pressing grinding parts and distorted armor into place to help the mech get through it. Once Prime was standing upright – his considerable weight carefully centred over his uninjured leg - Ratchet shot his weary patient an aggravated look, "What did you do this time?" he demanded.

Optimus braced his large frame against one of Ratchet's medical benches and shook his head, his blue optics downcast. "I appear to have angered Will in some form... but I cannot fathom why."

"Humph." Ratchet bent down on one knee to look at the mechanical mess that currently made up Prime's upper thigh – the legacy of blocking a stray cannon shot from hitting Arcee. The medic poked an inquisitive finger into a leaking hydraulic, causing Optimus to hiss and sharply jerk his leg back from the probing. "You better process any ideas you have quickly," the CMO advised, "he sounds very unhappy with you."

Back in the plane, Lennox began descending the ramp, shooting disgusted glances at his wet foot and shaking it every second stride or so. He reached the ground and dragged his shoe back and forth on the concrete, trying to clean it without touching it. He was _so _going to have an ADULT discussion with that robot about privacy issues and how to remain discreet! Leaving strange _packages_ on the floor of a borrowed military plane was NOT on!

Waiting patiently on the other side of the bench Optimus was using, the three femmes that were Arcee lifted feminine optic ridges and shared glances with each other. Major Lennox was angry. Knowing what had happened on the plane, she wondered how her Commander was going to talk his way out of this one. While they – and most members of the Cybertronian species – knew full well that Optimus had the right to do as he pleased, it was going to be hard explaining themselves when they were on a different planet from home... Her triple forms watched Ratchet delve his agile fingers into Optimus Prime's injury. The purple Arcee cocked her head and looked across at the broad armored back of the huge red and blue mech, saying smoothly, "Would you like me to intercept him for you?"

Optimus sighed, his optics dimming and a low grumble coming from his mouth, "No – ouch, Ratchet! Careful! - let him come."

One of the Arcee bots laughed softly, while another one shook her head. The purple one smiled benignly, "As you wish..."

All of the bots swivelled their heads and looked down at the angry Major Lennox as he entered the hanger. The man had his shoulders braced. Face set in an angry scowl. He halted next to Ratchet and pointed up at Optimus.

"You~!"

Prime blinked down at him, remaining stoic. "Yes?"

"Why?! Why in the name of _GOD _are you determined to destroy my sanity?!" Will practically shrieked.

Optimus was taken back. He took a moment to process his answer. He hadn't seen Lennox behave like this before. The human was normally so calm and controlled, he was a reliable Leader, and an exceptional soldier, so what on Cybertron had crawled up his tail pipe and died?

"Well?" Lennox demanded, wanting answers, "Look at this!" He lifted his foot and pointed down at his wet sticky boot. "You better have the guts to tell me you know what this is!"

"That is your foot," Ratchet remarked dryly, arching one optic ridge.

"I KNOW THAT!" Lennox jabbed his finger at Ratchet, then pointed it again at Prime, "I want to know why - Jesus, I can't believe I have to say this – my foot had to step in YOUR mess!"

"What mess?" Ratchet asked, and looked up at Optimus Prime with a curious expression, studying the bigger mech's face. Prime was not known to be a slob. He was tidy and meticulous.

Optimus averted his optics, thinking, then his CPU spat out an answer. Understanding suddenly blossomed over the metal features of his face. "Oh. The puddle."

"YES! The _puddle_!" Lennox clenched his hands into fists and took deep breaths. The material of his Army-issue shirt strained to its limits over his flexing shoulders.

"... there's a puddle? Why did you leave a puddle? Of what?" Ratchet queried, putting his hands on his hips and staring hard at Optimus Prime. The big mech shunted air from his intakes and appeared as if he wanted to fold his body up and hide himself away from all of them.

"On the plane..." Prime murmured, his optics tracking the jerky movements of Lennox's angry posture.

"I know what it is, and so do you! It's disgusting! I stepped in it!" Will growled, his chest heaving. "You don't do things like that! Get some privacy for God's sake!"

Prime's face held a blank expression, then he carefully angled his head around to look at Arcee over his shoulder, "Arcee, you said you would clean that up for me."

The femme bots had the grace to appear apologetic and demure, "Sorry, I was distracted by your injuries. I was worried. It slipped my processor. Shall I do it now?"

Lennox threw up his hands, "No! God... nevermind! Don't worry about it! I'll get one of our guys to fix it, like we always do whenever you 'bots make a mess. Just... just... don't do it again!" He turned and stalked out of the hangar, muttering, "I'll tell the others it's normal for alien robots to make such messes of themselves. And no more bloody puddles! It's a biohazard! God knows what's in it." He began to leave, then stopped to grumble over his shoulder, "And get a room! We did give you one, for Christ's sake."

The Autobots watched the upset man leave stalk away, Lennox's stiff back disappearing into the darkness outside.

Ratchet eyed off Optimus Prime. Smoothly, he plucked up a large tool from his bench – and whacked Optimus heavily in the side of the head with it.

"OWW!"

Ratchet growled, "Stop winding him up~! Lennox doesn't need the extra stress!"

Chagrined, Optimus rubbed at the abused side of his head. He decided he was too tired and sore to argue the point and refrained from answering with anything more than a heavy grunt and the whine of his abused gears. He then realised that some sort of apology was in order if he wished to be repaired without too much pain.

"I apologise Ratchet. And perhaps you can continue fixing my leg? It seems to have lost all of its hydraulic fluid on the floor of the plane."

"Yeah, sure it did," Ratchet griped, returning to his administrations on Prime's damaged parts, not being too gentle with his repairing. "Learn to control yourself around the humans or I'll take your fun bits offline. Just see if I don't!"

THAT threat froze Optimus place. He didn't fear many things in life – but that was one of them. Slag. He stared down at the top of Ratchet's bent over head. He wouldn't be a mech if his delicate parts were disabled. Wouldn't look like one, wouldn't feel like one. Would the other's still obey his orders if he was neutered?

"You wouldn't... that's not _possible_..." Prime's trembling vocaliser announced with awe-struck horror.

Ratchet lifted his head to lock optics with him. "Wouldn't I? You over-interfaced slagger... there's more than one way to stop a mech." He jabbed a harsh finger into Prime's midsection, causing the Leader to lean backwards away from him with each jab, "Don't. Push. Me. Prime."

Optimus grimaced and pressed his thighs together protectively when Ratchet turned around to get some more tools– bravely ignoring the pain of his injured leg in favor of protecting his Prime assets. If the Decepticons knew Ratchet had _that_ sort of power, they would have surrendered long ago; abandoning their weapons en masse and swearing to be peaceful forevermore. He caught Arcee giving Ratchet a ferocious grin. He shouldn't be surprised that the femme would find Ratchet's threatened abuse of his 'bits' as funny, femmes found anything of that nature hysterical. She wouldn't be laughing if he lost his ability to be a mech... and became this galaxy's ugliest looking femme.

_**The next day...**_

Lounging outside the main operations hangar, leaning his elbow on one of the base vehicles in the shade, Epps watched his friend doing hard laps of the base perimeter. It was hot; as it always was in this part of the world; and Lennox was wearing only his small runner's shorts and sneakers. The Major was working himself so hard that Ratchet was standing outside the Autobot's hangar as well, not pleased with how hard the man was exercising in such extreme heat. The medic would scan the jogging Major every time he went past, and he wasn't happy with his results.

Exhaustion, mild heat stress, minor sunburn and moderate dehydration. And if the Major paused long enough to perform a waste function, probably watery diarrhoea as well.

Ratchet had tried to halt Lennox earlier, yelling at him to stop, but the human soldier just ignored him, intent on sweating and suffering his way to extreme fitness. The Autobot had also attempted to put his huge greenish feet in Will's path as he swept past, blocking his way, but he jogged around Ratchet's stray limb and sprinted away. The medic growled and volleyed a few swear words at Will.

Epps grinned. "Leave him be, Ratchet. He'll stop when he vomits."

"What?" Ratchet loomed over the black soldier. "Vomiting is a sign of severe gastrointestinal distress in your species! He must be stopped before he reaches that point!"

The man pushed his dark sunglasses back up his nose, "You can't stop him, and it doesn't bother him to throw up everywhere, so don't worry about it."

A nasty growl came from the Autobot. Epps shrugged at him in a 'what can you do?' gesture.

Determined not to be defeated – he had after all been in charge of 'difficult' patients of many species

for most of his lifetime – Ratchet stomped back into his hangar. Epps continued to watch Lennox without too much concern. He knew Will had issues; more specifically, Optimus issues; and jogging was one of his ways of working them out.

Pounding the concrete pavement, Lennox came around the corner of the Autobot hangar once more...

...and yelled when Ratchet took one long step outside the door and dumped a huge bucketful of water right on top of him. For the robot, the bucket was small. For the human, it seemed like a swimming pool had been dumped on his head.

Will staggered to a stop, arms hanging limply, his legs splayed, body soaking wet, his expression screaming 'What the fuck!'. He made loud heaving noises as he gasped for air.

Ratchet reached down and grabbed the back of Will's shorts, pinching the fabric between his metallic fingertips and lifting the man up into the air. The integrity of the tiny shorts held up – just.

"RATCHET~! Put me down!" Lennox's scream didn't get one ounce of obedience out of the robot. "What the hell are you doing?!"

Ratchet carried the man calmly, "Major, you are in need of medical treatment, and it is my job to ensure you get it."

"FUCK OFF!"

"No."

Epps snorted at that one. Lennox wasn't known for his swearing. He usually refrained from it, but every man had his limits, and with everything that had happened recently, Lennox had left his limits behind several days ago. Epps knew Ratchet was right. Lennox needed treatment. He had been set to wait for his friend to stop and throw up before he dragged him back to his quarters and made him comfortable so he could recover. Ratch had just beaten him to it, is all.

Ratchet lowered the struggling man onto his nearest med bench - listening to Will yelp at the contact of the cold steel bench with his bare skin - lying him on his back. He slammed a hand down vertically when Lennox rolled over to get to his feet and escape. The robots angry face with an expression of 'I will not put up with this shit' hovered over Will.

"If you value your place working with Optimus Prime, you will submit to treatment or I will contact your government and declare you medically unfit for duty."

Lennox's mouth hung open. "Wha..? You can't do that!"

"Watch me. Now please remove your clothing so I may treat you."

"LIKE HELL!"

Down at Ratchet's thick feet, Epps was bent over laughing.

Ratchet frowned, "Fine. Let's do things your way." Resting one gentle but restraining finger on Will's upper chest, he used his other hand to rip right through the man's flimsy shorts, disposing of them over the side of the table. He then lowered the palm of his hand over Will's struggling body and began emitting a cooling vapour.

"Your temperature is verging on the point of heatstroke, you must be cooled down."

"GIVE ME MY SHORTS BACK~!"

"I'm sorry Lennox, but they hinder my treatment of you, I need proper access to your heated skin."

Will grabbed Ratchet's finger and was vainly banging his fists on it. "Get off! This is assault! I'm fine, dammit, leave me alone!"

Having watched the remnants of Will's tiny shorts and underwear go flying over the side of the table, Epps recovered from his first round of booming laughter and began a whole new one. He cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled loudly, "Be grateful Ratchet's a man, Will!"

"Of course Ratchet is male, Robert," A well known femme voice said behind Epps, "What else would he be?"

"Oh, hey Arcee," Epps said cheerfully.

Lennox's eyes bulged out of his head when he spotted Arcee as she come to stand next to Ratchet. The main pink one stayed next to the medic, while the other two moved around to the other side of the bench. All of them watched him with rapt optics. His hands struggled to reach down and cover his crotch. "SHIT! Girls!"

Ratchet hummed to himself, checking his patient, "Your temperature has dropped, but you still need fluids. You have missed some parts of your body with sunscreen, hence your skin will need time to heal from the damage."

Will had stopped speaking and settled for moaning between clenched teeth. Robots. Bloody robots. Why had his Government offered such sadistical beings asylum? Were they stupid or just thoughtless?

"Ratchet! What are you doing to Lennox? Is he alright?"

The booming voice of Optimus Prime announced his arrival. Epps was biting into his fingers and wheezing. He knew Will would punish him later, but stuff that, this was too much fun, and fun was a rare commodity in the army.

"Optimus! Help! Quick!" Lennox yelled, beginning to struggle once again, kicking out his legs into the air and banging away at Ratchet's finger with one fist.

The bench Lennox was restrained upon shook with the force of the huge mech striding up to it. Will's eyes met Optimus Prime's worried blue optics. The Godly mech studied him with a kindly gaze. Will slowly realised that the Commander wasn't going to assist him.

"My sensors show your body to be in distress, Major Lennox. I hope Ratchet can be of assistance to you," the Autobot Leader spoke solemnly. "Your species is often overcome by sudden illness and you expire so easily."

With his hands covering his naked body, and his chest restrained by one alien robot finger, Will couldn't do much else but moan pitifully. If even the big guy wouldn't help him, he was screwed. Then his eyes bulged and his stomach lurched.

"Look out!" Ratchet warned the onlookers. Without delay, he turned Lennox onto his front so his head was over the side of the bench and waited while the man brought up his stomach contents all over the floor in several painful heaves.

"I told you he'd do that," Epps told them patiently, nodding his head.

The optics of the Autobots shared Will's pain. It seemed that ejecting the contents of one's tank was a malady shared between their species. They all knew how unpleasant that was. Purging was never a nice thing to do.

In between dry retching and utter misery, Lennox lay weakly on the bench and quietly swore to get back at Ratchet for this. And Optimus, since he'd refused to help.

_Especially_ Optimus.


	5. Chapter 5

**Male Is As Male Does**

**Authors Note: **There are some really great stories out there right now, and everyone is updating chapters too! I love it! Once again, thank you big time for all the enthusiastic reviews and comments. I'm using one comment made by 'Stripperella' about 'sexual species' in this chappie, and I'm crediting it to her here, since I can't contact her to ask. Thanks!

**Chapter 5**

Will Lennox turned over the small package he'd been presented with by the ever helpful newly-recruited Autobot, Wheelie. It was supposedly a present sent by the Autobot's Head Medic – Ratchet – as an apology for ripping up his clothes the day before. The tiny Autobot had carried the package (it was as big as him) carefully over to NEST's human hangar; zig-zagging along the tarmac because his view of where he was going was mostly blocked by his cargo. He insisted it was for Major Lennox only. The tiny bot was on leave from hanging around his 'Warrior Goddess' (Mikaela) since Optimus believed the new recruit required some training and supervision.

"Shorts?"

Wheelie stood tall on his miniature tyres and clasped his hands together, bouncing his head up and down, "Yeah, yeah, the Doc thought he'd better replace the ones, he, um, _removed_ from you, y'know? Looks good huh?", he explained enthusiastically.

Lennox frowned at his colorful present. Ratchet had no taste or style, obviously. Or maybe he was gay? The three pairs of undersized satin shorts wrapped in plastic looked Hawaiian, their shiny fabric splashed with glowing neon flowers and random bits of eye-watering green. The day would never dawn that he was ever going to do his training jog around the base in those; he'd be trussed up and tossed into a waste dumpster by the other NEST soldiers. Or dragged into a vacant hangar and propositioned.

Looking over Will's shoulder, Epps clicked his tongue. "Man 'o man, those are some sweet pairs of threads. Must've cost Ratch' a fortune. It's amazing what aliens can buy on the internet these days."

The Major rolled his eyes but kept his mouth in a firm pressed together line. While he was pleased that the CMO was trying to soothe his feelings after destroying his prized shorts, he didn't truly know if this was yet another joke being played on him by the funny-as-all-hell alien robots. The shorts were two sizes too small, they wouldn't make it past his lower thigh. He KNEW the bots could accurately scan and measure his body size far better than any human tailor ever could – especially Ratchet - so why was he being given shorts that didn't fit?

"Yes, but... I need a medium size," Lennox muttered, "these are extra small. Even if I did want to wear them, they won't fit." He scowled. What was Ratchet trying to communicate? Why _small_ shorts?

Then his eyes widened. That bastard!

"_RATCHET_!" he hissed.

Epps looked askance at him. "What now?"

Will clenched his fingers into the plastic, getting it to squeak, "He's given me a small size because he's trying to say that I don't have much to cover!"

His technical specialist didn't understand, asking evenly, "Explain. Please."

"He's trying to say I'm small!" Lennox gestured wildly at his crotch, "That my bits are undersized!"

"Oh." Epps screwed up his face thoughtfully, "Well, you know, maybe he's right. We're small compared to what the Autobots think of as big," he then smirked wildly, "particularly if they've all been hanging out in a locker room with Optimus Prime."

Trying to appear friendly, Wheelie nodded agreeably, "Yeah, even if you sewed them all together, those shorts wouldn't even cover half of what he's got. Lucky slagger. Femmes love him!"

Two pairs of suddenly interested human eyes locked onto Wheelie.

"Say that again?" Lennox demanded, nursing his stepped-on-by-robots ego.

Realising his error, the tiny blue and silver bot began reversing up nervously, "I shouldn't have said that... pretend I _didn't_ say that... you know my mouth is bigger than me, don'cha?"

The human soldiers both took steps towards Wheelie.

"DON'CHA?!"

"I think we just found ourselves a bot that can tell us about all the weirdo things that have been going down around here, don't you agree, Will?" Epps smiled, his face turning into the feral expression he used when he was after something.

"Hey! I'm just goin' by Prime's reputation here, I don't know nothin'!" Wheelie replied indignantly. He spun around on the spot and began to accelerate away, but he was too slow. Will's hand latched into his head and lifted the panic-driven bot up into the air. "PUT ME DOWN! I won't help ya! I WON'T!"

Wheelie was lifted up to go face-to-face with a determined Will Lennox. His smile was textbook. "We have ways of making you talk..."

So it was that a horrified Wheelie found himself ushered into Lennox's private quarters and a large tin of ultra high-grade aviation gasoline shoved at him.

"All yours, my friend," Lennox grinned, as both he and Epps took two chairs and sat themselves down in front of the now ecstatic robot. "Just tell us what we want to know, and enjoy yourself afterwards."

Wheelie clutched it greedily, unable to believe his luck. High grade – for him! He never got anything like this from the Decepticons! These guys rocked!

"I suppose I can reveal a _few_ things," the small bot said slowly, hugging his prize to his chest, "it's not like it's a huge secret among Cybertronians, you know?"

"Exactly," Lennox assured him, "just common knowledge. Now speak. Do you guys reproduce sexually or not? Optimus and Arcee have been doing some pretty strange things around here lately. We want to know what's going on, we're tired of speculating via nasty surprises."

Wheelie carefully lowered his high-grade to the floor and patted it contentedly, "We don't call it sex, we call it interfacing, and it ain't exactly the same, but it's close enough to confuse you guys."

"You hump Mikaela's leg," Epps pointed out, "and Arcee has been getting sounds out of Optimus that makes us think he's humping _her_."

Will screwed shut his eyes for a second. Dammit Epps, don't be so crude! And he needed to get images of giant humping Autobots out of his brain yet _again_.

Wheelie shrugged, "Optimus is allowed to, she belongs to him."

"Allowed to? He owns her or something? Is this a relationship?" Epps asked.

"You humans, you're very primitive, your reproduction techniques and relationship systems work on luck. There's not much regulation or science in it. Ironhide called you a sexually immature species," the small bot chuckled, "and he's right."

Will and Epps exchanged glances. Ironhide said that? That sounded far too intelligent coming from their big black friend. Not to mention insulting. Ironhide was going to be rounded up into a corner and get a talking to.

Wheelie continued, "When I say he owns her, he OWNS her. He's the Prime. All female Autobots belong to him."

"They're slaves?" Lennox said with sharp concern. Maybe they were getting in too deep here. Optimus didn't seem like the kinda guy who kept slaves.

"Nah, not slaves. Unless a femme declines him her service outright – and hence his protection - he owns the right to use any unbonded femme as he sees fit. He has the right by law to ask them to be his before any other mech can get near them. Don't get me wrong, he can't force them. They can say no – but Primus," Wheelie made a show of twitching his optics, "what femme says no to what he's got to offer, yeah?"

"You're saying Optimus is like some sort of King; and the Autobot girls are his servants," Epps asked with a furrowed brow, "am I right?"

"This is confusing..." Lennox grumbled.

Wheelie scratched his head. "Yeah, sorta like that. See, a Prime is responsible for the protection and sheltering of all Autobot females. He looks after them, and in return..." Wheelie made a crude gesture with his hips, "he gets exclusive benefits. A Prime doesn't share those he's chosen. Those femmes become one bot women until he excuses them."

Will lifted his hands, his brain ticking over. "Wait, wait. You're saying 'all his females'. How many are there?"

"Harem, told ya, they're polygamous," Epps muttered, shifting his weight in his seat. "This must've been what Ironhide was referring to as Prime's duties."

"There used ta be thousands of them before the war, but now, I think there's only a handful left, if that," Wheelie stroked his left hand over his high grade affectionately. "The protocols are old. The old ways... even before the war started, Optimus didn't adhere to all the old traditions, he wasn't strict, but if he's using Arcee, he hasn't forgotten."

"Uh huh." Will was beginning to get the picture. "What did you mean by 'unbonded'?"

Wheelie's shoulders sagged. It was going to be a long discussion before he got to his high-grade. Damn curious humans. "Femme's and mech's can bond. They fall in love, think they've found their Primus-destined mate, and they bond their sparks to one another. It's like, ah..." Wheelie clicked his fingers, thinking, "your marriage. Yeah, that's it. But we don't divorce, you can't break a bond unless one of the bots dies. Prime can't use a bonded femme. No one can. See, if Prime doesn't want a femme, she's free to do what she wants, while still able to ask for his protection."

Will and Epps were silent. Will stared up at the ceiling, thinking, while Epps looked at Wheelie with pursed lips.

The Major shook his head as a thought came to him, "If more Autobot femmes land... they're Prime's. We could end up with a whole base full of Optimus's women."

Epps started laughing, thinking of watching the Big Guy being trailed around everywhere he went by a whole bunch of adoring female robots. Heck, if even Epps thought the huge alien Commander was handsome, he shuddered to think how vicious needy alien robot women would be. The fights would be legion... they'd never have Deception trouble again. They'd all flee the planet.

The small ex-Decepticon bot nodded, "Yeah. Although, Optimus is more concerned with needing warriors, not interface partners. You won't see a whole lot of femmes waiting around for a pleasant time with him when he's free. He has them trained and ready to fight, and like I said, the war has changed things. Prime needs fighters, not wimpy lovers."

"Oh no; no; Optimus is still doing the lover thing..." Will said, putting his hands on his knees with a faintly sickened expression. "You should've seen what he did to my plane."

"Huh? What'd he do?" Wheelie looked at the human curiously.

While Will closed his eyes and grimaced, unable to speak of it directly, Epps laughed.

"He left a deposit of a reproductive nature on the floor. Will says it was a big puddle," Epps smirked.

"Ohhh... that." Wheelie clicked his optical ridges together. "Prime's can get randy. They're legendary for that. I did hear that previous Prime's were much worse than Optimus, much worse. This Prime is tame compared ta them."

"Thank God for that, if I ever find Optimus and Arcee rolling around on the tarmac, I'm using my gun," Lennox covered his face with both hands and heaved a big sigh. This was like a car crash. He couldn't stop looking and listening. Then he paused, his body going still. "Ratchet said he had to help Optimus transform. He couldn't have transformed in the back of that plane – so how the heck did they get together to create that puddle?!"

Wheelie snorted, "Like I said, you're a very immature species. We don't need to transform to be active, know what I mean?"

Lennox blinked, "Wha...? You're saying..." his voice rose to a near shout, "SHE HUMPED HIS TRUCK?!"

Wheelie squealed with laughter, "She don't need to hump it! She used her hands! She would've waited for him to slide back some of his metal out of the way and then gotten her fingers underneath him into where his interface was. Easy!"

While Lennox tumbled from his chair to kneel on the floor and groan while smacking at his head with one hand, Epps pondered the situation critically.

"It's great to be a giant alien leader isn't it? You get to carry whopping great guns and be superior to stupid tiny organics while getting handjobs from your warrior women," he quipped. "I love the army."

"Hey, that's what Megatron used ta say..." Wheelie said wisely.


	6. Chapter 6

**Male Is As Male Does**

**Authors Note:** I was fumbling around in the dark a bit with this chapter. I had my ideas and plan all sorted out, but I was struggling to bring it together. Hopefully everything will work better with the next episode! ::smacks forehead::

**Chapter 6 **

Will Lennox and Robert Epps sat still and silent in their Army Jeep parked at the edge of the base well away from the prying audios and optics of their alien friends.

It was a beautiful day. Sunny, warm, with a slight breeze, and the pair of them had managed to arrange some time for themselves to discuss important matters – matters involving how the heck to 'prank' beings from another planet when said beings were taller, bigger, way more intelligent and much more experienced at pranking other species while still remaining 'civil' and diplomatic. What made the situation difficult was that while the mighty Optimus Prime had been underhandedly playing with their fragile egos, he had been careful to not allow real evidence of his activities to be held up as 'proof' that his species had sex. There was _nothing_ that Lennox could satisfactorily hold up to his superiors and say, 'Look! Look what those crazy insensitive aliens are doing right under our noses!'.

Not a damn thing.

Will was determined that Optimus Prime and Ratchet were going to feel his human wrath for the subtle but neverending pokes to the humans dignity and pride. Especially Will's _man_ pride. Remembering being stripped of his clothes and examined naked in front of everyone still gave him the creeps, and Optimus had refused to help him. Not to mention that stepping in Optimus Prime's 'reproductive fluid' - or whatever the heck they called it - made him want to beat his forehead in with a brick. He'd steered clear of hitching a ride in the back of THAT plane ever since. Prime's 'puddle' had been neatly cleaned up, but Will could still imagine the sight and smell of it. Heck, his brain kept coming up with images of Arcee doing THAT to Optimus so he was able to produce the damn puddle... he could visualise one of the Arcee triplets nimbly threading herself under Prime's truck chassis – maybe Prime even lifted himself higher on his suspension to give her more room - her hands stroking the metal covering his intimate parts, listening to the happy noises the big Prime was no doubt making when the femme's eager hands contacted his heated metal. Thinking of Optimus Prime's great and powerful mass shivering and trembling with pleasure made Will squirm.

"I still can't think of anything," Lennox groused unhappily, shaking his head to clear out his memory and staring out the windscreen at the view of the ocean.

His face behind his black sunglasses carefully neutral, Epps nodded, "Me either."

"C'mon, we're soldiers, the America's finest, surely we can think of something!" Will said with a trace of desperation. "Anything! Throw me a bone here!"

Only loaded silence filled the interior of their vehicles cabin. Lennox furrowed his eyebrows, thinking. Epps tapped his fingers on his thigh while he brooded. Something metallic clicked and creaked as it cooled under the Jeep's chassis. The silence continued.

"... we haven't got a hope in hell, have we?" Lennox groaned, joining his hands together on top of the steering wheel and thunking his forehead onto them.

"Nope," Epps agreed companionably. "But hey, look at it this way. If you do something he doesn't like, he could squish you. If you offend him, he'll squish you. Make him angry... again, he'll squish you. Maybe it's better to just leave some things alone, you hear me? No do, no squish."

"You like saying 'squish' a lot, don't you?" Lennox retorted nastily.

_**The next day...**_

Will was usually a good sleeper. Indoors, outdoors, in a bed, on hard rocky ground, squeezed into a tent with fifty other soldiers, or getting a few nods by resting his head on the shoulder of a fellow soldier in the cargo hold of an airplane midflight. Despite the considerable worries that rested on his shoulders when it came to war, he was always able to switch off and rest.

He was good at rest.

Not now.

He supposed he should find it significant that what was disturbing his rest now was his imagination showing him all the different techniques and positions Optimus Prime used on his harem of femme Autobots. He had neat dream scenes in his head of Prime sitting on some sort of robot-sized throne, using one hand to beckon the next willing femme in line to come and 'see' him for some attention, while the other hand wielded a hefty rifle and shot at passing Decepticons.

The final straw came when at 4:46 in the morning, the upset writhing and tossing of his body in restless sleep finally landed him in one-roll-too-many on the floor. Hard. And since the floor was concrete...

"Owww... crap..."

He stayed slumped where he had landed on his side. His eyes shuttered closed with a long groan. What eventually made him move was the cold seeping into his naked upper torso from the floor. Will clenched his fists, his nose pressed into the concrete.

"Right! That's it!"

He staggered to his knees and leant on his rumpled bed with his elbows, slamming one fist into the soggy pillow. If his body wouldn't let him rest peacefully, he was going to make it work. He was going for a run – despite the threat of Ratchet chasing him down and dangling him from his shorts in front of the whole base. Ratchet be damned, he needed some exercise.

Hopping around on alternate feet, he slipped on a pair of running shorts (not one of those gifted to him by the CMO, no way) and chucked on a pair of ratty running shoes. His head ducked out of his room and peered through the window across the hallway. Great. The sun was up just enough so he could see where he was going. He didn't want a frantic Autobot chasing him down for his own safety, yelling that it wasn't safe because he didn't have headlights to see with. Damn Autobots were overly obsessed with safety.

Will padded soundlessly on rubber-clad feet out of the human soldiers accommodation and onto the tarmac. Apart from the sentry soldiers, everything was quiet. Lovely. He indulged in a few stretches and shakes before he began. He was bending over and rubbing his calves when someone startled him.

"Going somewhere, Major?"

Lennox's head snapped around. Optimus Prime himself was standing tall and serene to his right, looking down at him with gentle optics. The half-light of the dawning sun made his red and blue metal glow like that of a God. How the heck had the insanely big mech sneaked up on him like that? Someone should put a bell on him. Epps would do it. Epps did anything he told him to do, reasonable or not.

Will straightened up. "Good morning. Yeah, I thought I'd try jogging again, if Ratchet can keep his paws to himself. I couldn't sleep." His brain turned over; why wasn't Optimus with Arcee exercising his 'rights'? Had he finally reined in his need to belittle the humans with his overt display of superior masculinity? Any off-duty free time Optimus obtained usually translated into 'Let's whisk the femme off somewhere and have fun!'.

Prime's optics brightened. "Ah. I guessed as much. Your species is at its most active when mostly naked, and you are only wearing one small patch of cloth."

Will's eyes widened. He didn't know wether to laugh at that or not. Now he thought about it, yes, exercise and sex meant the use of very little clothing. Very perceptive of aliens to notice that. Hey, had Optimus thought he was going out for sex?

Lennox jerked and then blurted with more force than he meant to, "Jogging! I'm jogging!"

One of Prime's optic ridges rose up comically, his blue optics glowing steadily. "You did inform me of that." The huge mech's head lifted to look at the sunrise, studying it. "Would you permit me to accompany you? Ratchet insists that I stretch out the parts in my legs after the repairs from our last incursion, and it is a beautiful morning, is it not?"

Lennox looked surprised. He stared at the length of the Autobot Commander's legs compared to his own. They were long, powerful, and from his tiny perspective; deadly. His gaze wandered higher, then he realised what he was intently staring at and snapped his eyes back to lower ground. He didn't want a close-up at the junction of Prime's thighs of what it was that Arcee found to be intensely interesting about the handsome mech...

"You want to run too? There's no way I could keep up with you, and you might.. uh..." he winced, pausing. "Hmm." He didn't know how to express his fear of being trodden on and squished into the pavement like roadkill without sounding rude.

"Step on you?" Prime rumbled with a faint smile. The massive mech unclasped his hands from behind his back and rolled the component metal of his shoulders and chest. It was an impressive display of latent strength. Standing right next to the alien warrior, Will heard the subtle hiss and digital whine of multiple parts in his chassis. "I will not be running. Walking is sufficient for my purposes, and I believe I can reliably restrain myself from stepping on your person."

Will had to let forth a smile at Prime's light tone. It was the closest Optimus ever got to being humorous.

"Alright. Sure. It would be nice to have company, and hey, if you're with me, we can run outside the base perimeter on the grass, the ground is better than the tarmac," he glanced up at Optimus sincerely, "I couldn't think of a better armed escort than you."

"Yes," Optimus cocked his head and nodded, understanding Will's logic, "like Ironhide is fond of saying, Decepticons tend to leak lubricants down their legs and flee when they sense my presence."

Lennox rolled his eyes with a chuckle, "Yep, I can believe that. Let's get going."

It was awkward at first. Will would settle into his running pace and find he was losing ground against the bigger striding Optimus Prime, then he would speed up at the same time as his big friend would slow down, and they'd leapfrog each other. But they worked it out. The base sentries at the fences stared up open-mouthed at their early morning three-storeys-tall metal visitor, ignoring Will panting and huffing his way along. Will was an ordinary human, while Optimus was a walking talking God. Some of them saluted, others just froze in place. Optimus Prime out for a walk was an awesome; if intimidating; sight for most of them.

Lennox was enjoying his time with Optimus. With no femmes, no accidents, no soldier duties, no emergency; nothing but a nice companionable morning walk and jog; it was relaxing. Their duties as Leaders and soldiers left behind for the moment.

Optimus Prime watched his friend run freely along, always mindful of where his own huge feet were in relation to the much smaller human. The Autobots would surely lose their status as refugees on Earth if their Leader stomped a human flat – accident, or no.

--_You better be keeping an optic on that man, Prime! He likes to damage himself!--_

Optimus paused in his next step at the abrupt intrusion over his internal comlink while glancing back at the main hangar in the distance. He could see the CMO standing on the tarmac and watching them. _--Good morning, Ratchet--_

_--If Lennox overheats again, strip him, dangle him into the sea for a bit and call me. Don't worry about saving his slagging dignity, worry about his life. You got that?--_

Prime shook his head and resumed his walk _–Yes Ratchet-- _

He could see the disgruntled medic cross his arms defiantly over his chest, staring him down even though he was far from their position. Optimus' faceplates smiled faintly. Ratchet was a brilliant medic. Prime had never seen his equal. He often contemplated wether Ratchet's OTT tactless and bullish personality were the result of his own character traits or was due to his innate brilliance, with perhaps the medic realising that being 'the best' meant his manners fell by the wayside. Brilliance was like that.

Will didn't notice Prime's momentary pause, he was too intent on pushing his body at a pace that satisfied his need for a good workout. Hearing a soft grunt from Optimus behind him, and noticing the absence of the Autobot's heavy thumping strides, Will turned his head to look back at the giant mech – and tripped on a large clump of tussock grass. His arms flailed wildly.

"....argh!"

Prime snapped his attention forwards. "Major Lennox?"

The human in question was lying on his front with his aft stuck up in the air. Grumbles about 'dignity', 'idiocy' and 'stupid morons' drifted over to Prime's sensitive audios. When Will showed no signs of regaining his feet – settling instead to lie there on his squashed up arms and berate himself – Optimus closed the gap between them with two big strides and knelt on one knee next to the human soldier.

Prime's giant finger tapped gently at Will's back. "Lennox? Are you damaged?"

A muffled snort and a snappish "...go away... my ego just died..." came back at him.

Optimus shook his head. If Lennox didn't get back onto his own feet quickly enough, Ratchet would soon be charging over the hill and forcefully grabbing the human to check for injuries. His gaze locked onto the back of Will's shorts. Well, if it worked for Ratchet... Prime's fingers descended. Using a pinching motion, he latched onto the tiny shorts and lifted Will up off the ground. He almost unbalanced the man so he was hanging head down, but a quick poke at the man's thighs had his body dangling feet first instead.

"Not the shorts! NOT THE SHORTS...! Shit!" Will flailed and reached around himself to batter ineffectually at Prime's fingers. "HEY!"

After reassuring his struggling charge that he would not drop him, Optimus used the opportunity to dangle the man in front of his glowing blue optics, intently checking for injuries, turning Will's body so he could scan it. "Hmmm. No damage done that I can detect, however, I am not a medic."

"You can't DO this to people! We're not pets! And tripping over in sand doesn't KILL me!" Will screeched, swinging from side to side in Prime's pinched grip. His face was red and sweaty. Hands in fists. Feet jerking uselessly.

Optimus contemplated that it was unusual to see the Major so upset. He was generally a quiet, respectful and determined man who didn't let anything fluster him. He had adapted to the presence of the Autobots and Decepticons without question. In all of his lifetime, Optimus had met few creatures in his travels that accepted him and his soldiers with so little fuss, but Major Lennox was one of them.

"Prime, what are you doing to Lennox?" a deep voice with a more gravelly pitch than Prime's rumbling tones interrupted the duo.

"IRONHIDE!" Lennox yelled, struggling and swinging, "Thank God! Help! Evacuate! Rescue! Initiate Plan C!"

Coming up the hill on the other side of Optimus and Lennox was the black intimidating mass of Ironhide and the sweet curves of the Arcee triplets. The femmes whizzed in their upright forms on their single wheels up to the massive Autobot Commander – and Will was shocked to see two of them clearly reach out and smack Optimus on the aft mischievously as they went past. The remaining (and more civil) femme glanced at her sisters with disapproval at such an act. Startled; but not having minded the disobedient slap; Prime favored the two misbehaving femmes with a smirk, his own optics clearly watching the sexy sway of the femme's own afts with interest as they proceeded past.

Lennox hung open-mouthed at the rare display of affection between the mech and femmes. "Gah..."

Ironhide halted next to Optimus and growled, "Drop him. NOW. Stop treating the organics as play things. He has legs, let him use them." Lennox was his human and he didn't approve of the other Autobots messing around with him. He'd heard what Ratchet had done to Will the previous day, and now Optimus was doing the same thing. The humans were tiny, but they were also brave, intelligent, kept fighting no matter the odds, and made good soldiers. They deserved more respect.

Not paying attention to his Weapons Specialist, Prime jerked his head from studying the cheeky femmes to face Ironhide, "What?"

Ironhide huffed and hitched up his shoulders menacingly, "I _said_, put him-"

The tiny shorts Prime was holding between his fingers ripped. They'd given up being used as a handle. His underwear wasn't impressed with the situation either – they ripped too. Lennox let loose with a volley of expletives as he plummeted to the ground, landing on top of a sandy dune with a thump. Since Optimus had been kneeling, Will's fall wasn't too much of a distance for him to handle. But still...

Rolling his optics, Ironhide snorted, "Nevermind. Will, are you alright?"

Lennox rolled over onto his back, flexing his limbs gingerly. He grimaced up at the looming concerned Autobots, snapping, "NO!"

Prime was mortified. After staring at the flimsy tattered cloth fluttering between his fingers, and internally berating humans for ever wearing such blatantly flimsy armor, he lowered his head, "Lennox! I apologise! I didn't mean for that to happen!" He quickly ran a scan over Will's body, letting a sigh of relief out of his airtakes and settling back on his heels when he found no broken bones or squished bits. "You appear to be undamaged, thank Primus. Ratchet should take a look at you to confirm this."

Ignoring him, Will grumbled snidely to himself, sitting up. "You owe me so bad." He rubbed ferociously at the sand covering his upper body. "The Government owes me, America owes me, the SecDef owes me, heck; the whole flippin' _universe_ owes me for putting up with _you_ _lot_!"

Then he saw the three Arcee's return to halt next to Prime. The smiles on their faces reminded him he was naked again. He frantically covered his groin with his hands. "AND SOMEONE GET ME SOME CLOTHES~!"


	7. Chapter 7

**Male Is As Male Does**

**Authors Note: **Yes, here we go again. This chapter is Ratchet heavy, with some Optimus Prime thrown in (literally) close to the end. It starts out slow and then – well. Ahem. I haven't given this fic an 'M' rating yet, but be warned, there are descriptions of human and Transformer reproduction methods in this. There's the human 'p' word and the 'v' word, if that makes sense!

**Chapter 7 **

It had been quiet at the NEST base. Quiet, as in, no yelling to armor up, no dashing around, no planes being rushed into take-off readiness – quiet. A 'no missions' kind of quiet. There had been no reports of Decepticon activities, and hence, no raids to ferret the little buggars out of hiding and into the friendly waiting rifles and cannons of the NEST group. Of course, Megatron and Starscream were still out there, waiting and planning their next move against the Autobots and NEST. No one doubted that.

Ratchet used the downtime to catch up on servicing and attending to the Autobots under his care. Being a new Autobot, Wheelie was now due to undergo his first Ratchet-certified service – if only Ratchet could find the little slagger. He wasn't answering his comlink, well, he _was _answering it, he just wasn't speaking into it. A fit of giggles, slurred moans and sighs came back at the hulking Hummer. Requests to attend his service appointment by Ratchet were met with insane giggling.

Ratchet was now prowling the base in irritation, his thick feet carrying his big mass from building to building, searching for the tiny ex-Decepticon. He had quickly repaired Wheelie's destroyed optic (Mikaela had torched it when the pair first met) when they returned from Egypt, but he hadn't had a chance to conduct a full exam and history on the little bot, since the more important warrior mech's came first. While the others were not so accommodating of Wheelie's presence, he and Optimus accepted Wheelie's plea to become an Autobot with very little drama. Wheelie was still to prove himself totally trustworthy, but they treated him with a neutral attitude, unlike Ironhide who wanted to string him up like a dope on a rope and use him as a target drone.

The CMO finally found the delinquent in the supply warehouse. He was sitting on the floor just inside the entrance with his feet stuck out in front of him, his back to the wall, and his precious tank of high-grade balanced on his tummy while he cuddled it like a teddy bear.

"Wheelie..." Ratchet growled, propping his fists on his hips and glaring down at the small bot. Even without using his analysing medical scanners, the strong smell of aviation high grade wafted up at him from the container Wheelie was holding. The bot was over-energised. Drunk.

"Watchet~!" Wheelie burped and looked unsteadily up at the large mech, his head wobbling on his shoulder struts. One blue optic and one red optic (Ratchet had repaired his destroyed optic with an Autobot issue optic, hence the color difference) swayed and dipped on their mounts to fix the large Autobot with a crazy stare. "Look what I got!", he announced proudly.

"I am," Ratchet frowned, his optic ridges rising, "where did you steal that from?"

Wheelie sat up straight indignantly, then found he couldn't keep his balance, and began leaning over sideways dangerously. "No steal! Present! Mine! G-G-Go away! I'm not s-s-sharing!"

Ratchet rubbed his forehead with stiff fingers. "Slag..." Crouching down on his toes and hanging his wrists off his thighs, he eyed off the little bot at close range, and began his next words with a conversational tone that quickly turned into a nasty growl, "I know you were given a flash download of the Autobot ethics code from Optimus when you first came here, but allow me to kindly remind of one small thing – NO DRINKING OF HIGH GRADE ON DUTY OR ON BASE IS ALLOWED!"

"Yeah?" Wheelie's optics crossed over together at Ratchet's face being so close, and he smiled. And burped. "Dumb Autobots... no f-f-fun! Hey! I thought no interfacing was allowed while on duty too, but Optimus does!" Wheelie's voice changed to become a passable imitation of Prime's distinctive voice, "Hey femme, I'm hot, you're hot, let's go some place NOT private and practise making little bots!"

Choosing to ignore Wheelie's juvenile stab at the Autobot Leader, Ratchet poked Wheelie's shoulder sternly, "You will be on report as soon as you sober up, and where did you get that stuff from anyway?"

"Can't tell," Wheelie snickered. "Lennox said not to say." His faceplates froze when he realised he'd given too much away be saying that. "Oops."

"...Lennox said not to – oh, for Primus sake. Major Lennox gave that to you? What on Cybertron made him do that?" Ratchet growled. Maybe the humans were sick of watching Optimus use Arcee as the base bicycle and wanted to help out the saner bots by passing out high grade to fuddle their senses with?

Even dumb aft drunk, Wheelie knew he was now in trouble. He crossed his arms over his head protectively. "Don't whack me, don't whack me, don't whack me-"

Ratchet whacked him.

"OWW! I _said_ don't _whack_ me~!"

"Tell me why he gave you the contraband. That's an order."

"You can't order me! You're not Big Boss, you're just Doc Bot!"

The CMO gave Wheelie a very non-friendly smile, "Yes, I am the 'Doc Bot', I am therefore very capable of making sure that there will be no Wheelie sparklings produced by you in your immediate future because you will be missing certain mech 'parts', and I'll get Ironhide to hold you down while I do it. Understand?"

"NO!" Wheelie wailed, his knees slamming together, knowing the game was over. These Autobots were more savage than he'd thought. His body sagged, faceparts drooping in defeat. "Squishies wanted to know about Optimus and Arcee. They offered free high grade, so I told'em."

"Don't call them squishies. You really didn't read through the rules, did you? And who is 'they'? Lennox and who else?"

"Er..." Wheelie twittered his optic covers up and down, "the black human?"

Ratchet's optics narrowed dangerously. "Epps."

"Yeah, yeah! Him!"

"Humph. How much did you tell them?"

Wheelie dropped his head back with a pouting expression and his vocaliser let out an illicit recording of one of Prime's more dirty deep moans while he pumped his hips.

"Slag... right you, let's go." Snagging one finger around Wheelie's arm, he lifted the bot up off the floor, "You're coming with me."

"Primus, don't say that, I don't want to 'come' with any of you! You're a bunch of over-interfaced perverts!" Wheelie whined. "The 'Cons were nasty, they beat me up, but they had better sensibilities than you!"

Holding the unhappy Wheelie in one hand, Ratchet used the other to pry his tin of high grade off him and toss it into a nearby bin. Watching his high-grade be disposed of, Wheelie hung dis-spiritedly from Ratchet's grip.

"...not my fault your Leader has an over-active interface drive... goes and leaves dis-_gusting_ deposits on the squishy plane, no wonder the fleshbags wanted to know about us, some Big Noble Leader he is," he mumbled and griped, hanging in Ratchet's merciless clamped fingers.

"Shut it!" Ratchet snarked, giving Wheelie a shake, his CPU on other things. So Lennox and Epps now knew _something_ about what his crude Commander was doing. He supposed it was inevitable when Prime couldn't keep his hands off any femme within reach of his femme-attracting lengthy arms. He scrunched up his noseplate. He wasn't going to blame Arcee for this, oh no, she was the innocent one, this was all down to Optimus-the-Fragger himself. Optimus Prime and his mech 'needs' had gotten the Autobots in trouble on more than one planet in the universe...

Ratchet halted his strides across the tarmac. Speak of the devils, there were the other two culprits. Lennox and Epps had their backs to them and were leaning over the hood of a NEST Jeep, pointing and squinting at a spread out map.

"You, stay here," Ratchet dropped Wheelie aft first into a garbage barrel and locked the lid closed. "You," he picked up a startled Will Lennox by the back of his Army shirt, "and _you,_" he did likewise to a very wide-eyed Epps, "are coming with me. NOW."

A cacophony of yells, screams and swear words emitted by the trapped Wheelie and the protesting two humans accompanied Ratchet back to the Autobots residential hangar. Waiting for a plane to land, Sideswipe transformed out of his car mode to stand and gawk at Ratchet stomping past with his prisoners.

"Must be service time..." he told an equally surprised Jolt with raised optic ridges.

Jolt twitched, "Know that feeling."

Epps reached up to keep his sunglasses from falling off his face, then cupped his hands over his mouth and yelled across at Lennox, "At least you don't have shorts on this time, Will!"

From his experiences in the past month, Will was now used to being treated by the Autobots as their favourite pet (he truthfully had thought that was Sam Witwicky's function) and hung in Ratchet's grip with his arms crossed over his chest and his feet dangling. It was the best tactical option.

"This better not be an anal exam, Ratchet," Epps grinned as Ratchet entered his own personal room, closed the door, then carefully lowered his captives to the ground.

Under any other circumstances Lennox and Will would have been fascinated to be allowed inside one of the Autobot's rooms, but right then they were edgy about what Ratchet wanted to discuss with them, particularly if it involved what they were thinking about. Ratchet was a medic, he was also a soldier – and a damn good one – who had no hesitations about dealing out deadly force physically or verbally to anyone or anything that got in his way.

Ratchet stood and stared down at the two soldiers. "I have just had an interesting conversation with Wheelie."

Looking up, Lennox leant back on his heels and kept his face expressionless. "Did you?"

The CMO nodded, "It was about high-grade, secrets, and what business Optimus Prime has with femmes."

"Now see," Epps waved a finger at the greenish robot looming over his head, "that's what we were trying to figure out. We didn't want to offend you asking things you may have been embarrassed about so we kind of, uh, kidnapped Wheelie and asked him a few questions. Don't blame the kid, we were very persuasive."

Ratchet narrowed his optics, "Wheelie may appear and act like a child, but he is not. Sergeant Epps, there are very few things I get embarrassed about. There is nothing about your bodies or ours that I am not familiar with or cannot attempt to treat. I can recall only a handful of times in eons past that I have been shocked by what an organism – organic or inorganic - can do or say about reproduction."

"Ah, is that right?" Epps pursed his lips. "So who has been filling up Optimus Prime's fuel tank with Viagra?"

Lennox wanted to pull his shirt over the top of his head to block out the world, get down on his knees and pray like hell that this was a dream sequence gone wrong. He was going to wake up in his bunk, and the Autobots weren't here, did not exist, and they definitely did not have sex. Big, metal, humping, LOUD, sex. And he wasn't trapped in a room with a cranky robot medic who could whup their asses good.

"I mean, it sort of hasn't escaped our notice that the big guy likes to spend his off duty time being happy with any one of the Arcee girls. You do know what happy means, don't you?"

"Not all off duty," Will interjected, "don't forget my _plane_. My poor, abused, _wet_, plane."

"I have counselled Optimus about the plane incident and he has been threatened with having certain parts taken offline if it happens again. He should now give your equipment more respect." Ratchet's optics meaningfully met the eyes of Will and Epps. "If he doesn't, I trust one of you two will inform me off it promptly?"

"If we see him humping anything he shouldn't be, you'll know about it because we'll be screaming about it," Lennox stated in a matter-of-fact voice, "loudly."

Ratchet rolled his optics. "I thought as much. Humans attach far too much emotional baggage to the subject of sex. What a mech and femme choose to do for pleasure is something we have been keeping private from your species because we have found that you become offended far too easily, but as you have made it clear that you absolutely must have an explanation for what you see as Prime's odd behaviour, I will now happily give you one."

Epps was practically bouncing on the spot (this from the soldier who showed emotion by lifting one eyebrow) while Lennox was wide-eyed and sweating. Ratchet was going to spill it! A long time after Optimus spilled it, but better late than a kick in the aft.

The medic bent down and offered his hand to the human duo. "Get on."

The humans stepped on and were lifted and deposited onto Ratchet's slim desk against the wall. Ratchet himself sat down in his chair and folded his hands together in front of him. Silence stretched out between the threesome while the CMO considered his words carefully.

"Transformers - as you call us," Ratchet held up a pointed finger, "but we refer to ourselves as Cybertronians – do have intimate relations. We have mechs; who are the males; and femmes; the females. From that statement I am hoping your intellect extends itself to realise that one of each gender is required to reproduce."

Epp's brow furrowed, "But the Allspark-"

Ratchet shoved a finger into Epps chest so the man backed up a step, "I am speaking, not you."

Lennox snickered.

"The Allspark was our primary method of producing new Transformers, especially new _adult_ Transformers, which is what Megatron wanted. He desired whole armies of them just to serve him as expendable warriors. As Optimus Prime explained to you, he ejected the Allspark out into space to stop his brother from using it for this purpose." Ratchet sighed and scratched at the side of his neck, "...I'm getting off track here. Ahh.... there are many ways to produce a new bot and I will not explain each one of them here, except for what happens between mechs and femmes, this is what you want to know, is it not?"

Epps made a small movement of pumping his fist. Lennox folded his arms and ignored him while giving Ratchet a short nod.

"Mmm. Well, I have seen what your species does for reproduction-"

"Not first hand, I hope!" Lennox blurted, horrible images of Ratchet crouching in front of a fornicating human couple and taking notes assaulted Will's brain.

Ratchet frowned at him and cocked his head, "Of course not, I would not be that crude, besides, your World Wide Web is very informative. This gives me a good starting point when comparing our species similarity. You both are male and have a penis, correct?"

Lennox blinked then glanced worriedly down at Epp's groin, "I haven't seen it personally but I sure hope he does..."

Epps growled at him. "Hey, white boy, if you want to compare sizes I'm willing and able to drop my pants right now! So don't push it!"

Will laughed at him.

Ignoring the men's banter, Ratchet went on, "Mech's have a corresponding piece of equipment in the same place as yours and we call it an interface rod. There are many slang terms for it; spike, cord, appliance, mini-mech; but it is essentially the same. It is a medium sized flexible tube-like structure that does not extend itself to its full length and thicken unless the situation calls for it. We do not, however, have testicles."

The yellow-green Hummer waited while the two men digested that. Lennox's mouth was hanging open and he appeared incapable of closing it. Epps was staring at a point on the wall behind Ratchet's shoulder and making a 'Hmmm' noise.

Lennox slowly lifted one hand to get Ratchet's attention, "If mech's have a, um..."

"Interface rod."

Will spoke at the same time as he ran some scenarios through his head, "Yeah, that. Then do your femmes have... uh... they must have, like, something for the rod to go _into_."

Ratchet bestowed a small smile on him, happy that the man seemed to be thinking scientifically, "Our femmes have a receptacle referred to as a port that the rod fits into. What you would call a vagina."

Lennox went back to standing silently with his mouth open.

"I should explain that the word 'interface' is used as a general word to describe a mech's interface rod, a femme's port, and the reproductive act itself. You seem to use the word 'sex' in the same manner."

Ratchet didn't know if the humans had noticed, but Optimus Prime had just quietly entered his own room next door to Ratchet's. Accompanying Prime's heavier footsteps were three pairs of smaller femme feet. The medic hoped what he thought was going to happen, _didn't_ end up happening. His talk didn't need the kind of complications the massive Prime would no doubt happily provide.

"So... if you guys interface, what happens after that?" Epps asked, sticking his hands on his hips. "Babies?"

"No, that is a more intricate matter that requires the help of a spark merge and the activation of certain protocols. Interfacing by itself is an act of physical pleasure that can also involve the exchange of datatracks between the two participants." Ratchet met Lennox's eyes with his optics, "You do not need to worry about finding Optimus Prime's 'babies' all over the base, Major."

"I don't know whether to say I'm pleased or sad about that," Lennox laughed weakly, "and if you don't have testicles-"

"Let me just say a big 'thank you God' about that," Epps interrupted him with a grumble.

"- what the heck was it that I stepped in?"

"That," Ratchet smiled, "was data transmission fluid. It is produced at the moment of overload from the interface rod. It also contained a marker that would identify Arcee as one of Prime's conquests."

"Hey Will, you're a conquest!" Epps chuckled, slapping Lennox on the shoulder.

Will slapped him back, hissing, "I tossed those shoes out! I'm not anyone's _conquest_, damn it!"

Ratchet half-tuned the men out. He'd just heard the tell-tale metallic groan of Prime's recharge berth being sat upon next door. Cuddling. Cuddling is good, you fragger, don't make me come in there, the medic thought. His wish wasn't granted though. Arcee let out a breathy femme moan – and then Prime's lower pitched grunts started up. Worse still, the side of the recharge berth the pair were using began to shake and bang against the wall.

After taking in the sudden realisation of what the sounds were, Lennox went pale and held up his hands in surrender, beginning to back away from the wall, "Oh no, no way, they can't be, that's not right~!"

Ratchet growled and made a fist, smacking the wall with it, calling out loudly, "Cut that out, you four! I've got visitors!"

"RATCHET! I'm gonna rip you a new aft, you slagger! You locked me in a trash can! That's disgusting! Just you wait-"

Wheelie had escaped from where Ratchet had contained him. He'd heard Ratchet's voice and shown up at his door to deal out a shin-kicking. Or what he _thought_ was his door. The disturbing sight that confronted him was forever seared into his memory banks. What Megatron would _give_ to see Optimus doing _that. _

"_WHEELIE_!" Optimus Prime's ferocious roar of outrage made the tiny bot scream in terror and begin running faster than his CPU could make his feet go. It took Prime a few moments to disengage himself from whatever Arcee robot he was entwined with, so the soon-to-be-disassembled Wheelie had a head start, which was apt since it was Wheelie's head Optimus was after.

The ex-Decepticon had forced open Prime's door by mistake. No one had to guess or mention what it was that Wheelie had caught an optic-full of. Optimus went charging after the little bot, his footsteps making the hangar floor protest loudly and begin to crack.

"What are you upset about?!" Ratchet huffed at the two stunned human soldiers. "I'm the one who lives next door to him, imagine living with that each night!"


	8. Chapter 8

**Male Is As Male Does**

**Chapter 8 **

Captain Graham was at ease. He was beginning to enjoy his downtime. He was now used to the Autobots and the craziness associated with being around them; yes they were rather awesome, but they had their dorky moments too. He was happy to be in a warm, sunny environment - with a BEACH, no less! The British Military couldn't boast that! - and his talents and skills were being utilised to the best of their ability. It was a pleasure to show the new NEST recruits around the Garcia base and it was such a lovely day for a tour.

"Now this, gentlemen, is the Autobot's private hangar, and you will not – Jesus – EVERYONE HALT!" Graham flung out an arm to stop the handful of new troops from proceeding any further. He kept his arm out straight and waited patiently as Wheelie ran screaming full bore past him with a furious Optimus Prime not far behind at full stretch on his heels. The recruits stared with various degrees of awe and fear at the giant - and obviously angry – red and blue flamed robot.

Once the commotion was past their little group, Graham lowered his arm. Unruffled. He brushed at some dirt Prime's feet had flung up onto his uniform.

"Nothing to worry about lads, that big fella was Commander Optimus Prime. Nice bot, the biggest one here, very kind and concerned about humans but stay out of his way when he's pissed or you might have an accident. Right then, what was I saying? Ah yes, this is the Autobot's hangar, don't wander into it without an invitation, it's their sanctuary from us fleshbags. If you need something just stand in the doorway and scream, one of them will come out eventually."

Not many of the recruits were listening to the Captain. They were staring at Optimus Prime. All three-storeys-tall of him. Whatever they had thought alien robots would look like, this wasn't exactly it. The massive mech had lunged at the tiny running robot and was standing triumphantly on the tarmac with Wheelie grasped in one large hand. Holding Wheelie upside-down dangling from one leg and using his fingers as rough tweezers, Prime shook the little bot like a teddy bear.

Captain Graham noticed the complete lack of attention the new soldiers were giving him. His shoulders sagged a little from their usual proud and stiff position. Damn robots were always upstaging the humans.

"Ah, ahem. That's...," he cleared his throat, "ahem, that is a Decepticon that Prime is, er..." Graham winced as Prime smacked the tiny Decepticon on the aft and hissed something that sounded rude at him, "...training. He's teaching him how to be an Autobot. He switched sides during the skirmish in Egypt."

The eyes of the recruits all looked at Graham with a united expression on their faces of 'You've got to be kidding'. Graham put on his best serious expression and stared back at them. Unflinching.

"I think it's time we went and checked out your duty rosters. Come along, gents." He led the nervous troops away, giving Prime space to chastise Wheelie. Whatever beef Optimus had with the ex-Con, Captain Graham didn't want to know about it. If Wheelie was drop-kicked into the next country by the massive Commander's angry foot, Graham was going to plead the fifth.

Optimus noticed his convenient lack of a human audience, and turned his wrath on Wheelie. Blue optics that practically flamed with holy fury bore down onto the brave little bot.

"You will apologise to Arcee for interrupting us, and you will NEVER open a shut door again," Prime growled angrily, pointing a thick metal finger at Wheelie and poking him hard in the chest with it, "nor will you ever speak of what you witnessed."

"LEMME GO YOU STINKIN' AUTOBOT! And don't you wipe those fingers over me, I know where they've been!"

Prime braced himself at hearing such a blatant remark thrown his way, then shook his head with a very disappointed expression, "Wheelie, I do not stink, and after having experienced going hand-to-hand with Megatron, I can assure you that I clean my armor and protoform much more often than he ever does. Nor am I rusty." He gave Wheelie's chest another pointed jab, "And where I chose to put my fingers on Arcee is none of your concern!"

Wheelie didn't like being this close to the Autobot Leader. Sticking his fingers up in a double-barrelled version of 'The Bird' at the enormous mech like he'd learnt to do from the late departed Frenzy, he was determined to show that he was not a bot to be intimidated.

"Hey Prime, guess what?" Wheelie burst out.

Before Optimus could reasonably stop himself, he found his vocaliser grinding out a short-tempered reply. "_What_."

"Megatron is _bigger_!"

Wheelie flashed his bird fingers again at the dumb-founded Leader and started laughing.

Optimus cursed silently and forcefully took his weapons systems offline when they began to heat up from the frustration and fury flooding his systems. Normally he wasn't that easily flustered or irritated, but the interruption of his time with Arcee when he had been primed, intimately engaged, and ready to perform his duty - coupled with Wheelie's determination to 'get' him - had him on edge. He was in control enough to not let his inner thoughts or emotions show on his face, but he was feeling it. He ignored the fingers and Wheelie's taunt, and levelled a steady glare of 'I am not amused' at the ex-Con. He never expected his Autobots to be rude or disrespectful towards him, but that didn't mean he didn't know how to deal with it when it happened. It was time for a lecture.

"Young bot," his voice was determined and even, his optics blazing bright blue, "I expect that young and small mech's like yourself would not have much experience to be able to comfortably deal with what you just witnessed. However, I do expect you to use some maturity and grace to control your instinctive reactions. These are the hallmarks of an Autobot."

"Oh yeah?!" Wheelie thrashed in Prime's grip, waving his arms wildly, "You may think you're Primus's gift to femmes, but I'm not so innocent, or _little_! You mech's with the big interfaces, you don't have to work for things like we do, those of us with _economy_ size packages." Wheelie pouted, grouching his words and gesturing. "I've been around, I know what I saw! And you know what? I wanna go back to the Decepticons! NOW!"

Optimus Prime lifted his arm up higher and held Wheelie up in front of his face, close enough that if Wheelie had been so inclined, he could've reached out and smacked the Autobot Leader on the noseplates. Not that he'd go _that_ far. He was in enough trouble.

Optimus narrowed his optics dangerously at him and allowed his rumbling voice to drop to a disturbingly deep level. "Too late. You're with us now..." Then he began smiling. It wasn't a nice smile either.

Prime did not on principle lower himself to making threats or using blackmail, but he thought it was very appropriate at this time to remind Wheelie of _who_ controlled the femmes in his army. He often used the same tactic on Ironhide when his more primal urges to blow things up and lose control made him dangerous to those around him.

"Wheelie, I am a Prime-"

"Well, DUH!"

"Be quiet," Optimus demanded, shaking a finger in Wheelie's face. "All femmes of Autobot allegiance are mine by Cybertronian law. You had better start improving your behaviour according to Autobot regulations - which I _know_ I transmitted to you - or I will refuse permission for any of them to be in your presence forevermore. I protect them and I guide their actions. Do you understand me?"

Wheelie jerked back with his mouthplates hanging open and then began to tremble, his blue scanty armor rattling loudly. Oh yeah, he got it. A future without a femme to play with was a horrifying one, and humping the leg of his Warrior Goddess wasn't going to cut it.

"Oh shit. Oh _shit_."

Optimus nodded, satisfied. His head lifted to look out over the airfield, optics shrewd, the sunlight filtering over the planes of his face enhancing the brilliance of his very male features. "I also think you need to spend some time on your own to contemplate how to improve your actions to an acceptable standard, and I have just the place."

**Outside Ratchet's room...**

Ratchet had shoo'ed the soldiers out, declaring his CMO duty over and done with. He'd conveyed only enough information as he was willing to part with, and no more. The men; for their part; weren't ready to _know_ any more about what their big robot friends did in their personal lives. They hadn't wanted to know right from the start. It was only Prime's strange behaviour that had forced the issue at all. Lennox in particular was struggling with the new intel. Being shorter than the bots meant that he was always looking UP at them; more specifically, up at their crotches; and now he had a good idea what Optimus was hiding behind his armored groin region, so he was going to make it a priority to practise not stammering and blushing when he looked upwards.

"You know," Epps paused as Ratchet gave him and Lennox a small wave on their way out of his room, "what he's saying sounds very logical to me. If someone had forced me to sit down and explain what I _thought _Transformer sex was like, I probably would've said something like Ratchet explained to us."

Lennox gave his friend a surprised look. Partly because Epps just didn't talk in long sentences, but also because he had been frantically hoping that robot sex involved extension cords and flash drives, and he now knew that innocent hope had died a crude death. Thank you very much, Prime.

"...I agree," Will said slowly, blinking in the sunlight streaming in through the hangar door. "It makes sense. Horrible sense, but sense." He looked around outside the hangar. "And where did Prime and Wheelie disappear to? I don't see robot blood sprayed everywhere, the big guy should've squished the little guy by now, Optimus ain't slow. Maybe we better-"

Epps stuck a finger past Will's face, stopping his words and forcing his eyes to look where he was pointing.

Will's eyes widened. "Oh."

Chained to the bottom of the NEST official flagpole at the edge of the airfield tarmac was the small form of Wheelie. The link chain Mikaela had originally used to restrain the Decepticon with was back in place around his neck, one end welded to the flagpole and the other to his neck. The tiny bot was sitting on his aft with his arms crossed angrily over his chest. He lifted his head to stare at Epps and Lennox.

"_What_?" he demanded. "Quit starin' at me! Haven't you meatsacks got somethin' better to do?! Leave me alone, willya!"

The meatsacks did indeed leave him alone, walking past him with their mouths shut and making nary a sound – until they turned the corner to their residential quarters, then their laughter came ricocheting back to him.

"Boneheads," Wheelie grumbled. Then the sky opened up and it started to rain. "HEY!"

_**One week later, on a mission to Columbia...**_

Will sat with his back to the wall of an abandoned ex-military compound. Fully armored up, packing heat and waiting for orders from NEST command. Epps sat on his right hand side. It was peaceful with just the two of them. Arcee, the Twins – Mudflap and Skids – and a small detachment of soldiers were scouting the area, performing reconnaissance and reporting their findings. So far, everything was quiet. Even the jungle surrounding them was quiet. And boring.

"What do you think their babies look like?"

Epps blinked a couple of times at having his peaceful silence interrupted and re-ran Will's words back through his head to make sure he'd heard him correctly. He then turned his head to squint at Lennox. "Excuse me?"

"Babies. Transformer babies. Ratchet said they could have them." Will shifted his weight from one butt cheek to the other, scrunching his backpack to the wall. "I wonder what they look like."

"This is dangerous territory, man, I don't think I want to go there with you." Epps faced forwards again, resolutely shutting him out.

Will insisted, "No, hey, I was thinking-"

"The thinking? Please don't."

"Oh shut up, hear me out," Will growled, "if Optimus has the option of reproducing, I think he should. I mean, look at what happened, Megatron took him down and we lost our Prime. Like Sam told us, Jetfire said Optimus was the _last_ Prime, apparently there used to be lots of them. Knowing what we're facing with the Decepticons, we need more Primes. I can't understand why Optimus hasn't figured that out already."

Epps gazed upwards at the cloudy sky, "...you think someone like Optimus should have babies."

Will glared at him, "What's wrong with that? I have a baby! There's nothing wrong with soldiers having babies."

"Right," Epps muttered, rolling his eyes.

"No, look, I'm being reasonable here. If Optimus has a son or daughter or whatever it is they have, then his family line will continue on. We're ensuring the survival of the Autobots," he pointed his fingers at himself, "and us! Humans, I mean. We need to have a Prime around. I think he should consider it."

"Then go and tell him, not me," Epps said warily, giving his friend a sideways look.

"...you're not helping," Will griped.

"Yes, I am. They're not married."

"What's that got to do with it?!"

"I don't think Arcee should be a single mother," Epps explained.

"Oh for...! They don't need to be married! Prime owns Arcee! Hell, they're already _doing_ it together, it won't take much of a stretch to actually produce something from it."

"Fine. Let me just say something here. Arcee is one quarter Optimus Prime's size. If whatever he produces as a baby is anything like him, I feel sorry for Arcee having to carry it. How's she supposed to be pregnant with his kid? Tell me that!" Epps huffed, pointing a finger.

"I don't know," Lennox shrugged, not put off, "but obviously they manage it somehow, because Ratchet was implying that they can do it."

Epps shook his head, "You're mad, man. And you know what?"

"What?"

"If Prime has to be changing nappies or whatever in the middle of the night, and staying awake to deal with all the carry-on a baby puts you through, how pissed-off and distracted is he going to be on missions? One mistake with that rifle of his and WHAM, that's a couple of us turned into carbonised particles, all because you bounced up and down telling Prime he should have a kid."

Lennox's eyes widened. "Oh shit... let's forget about the baby thing."

"Thank you."


	9. Chapter 9

**Male Is As Male Does**

Authors Note: I thought it was about time we looked at this whole thing (Prime's duties) from Optimus Prime's perspective. The humans have been ducking and weaving around the big guy, sorting out their own feelings, but what does Optimus think of things? Of Arcee? Of his duty to his species and his Autobots? Read on... Oh, and, this chapter is a two-parter, it is a set-up for the next chapter, that's why it is a little short.

**Chapter 9 **

**NEST base, early morning, before sunrise...**

It wasn't hard to think the day ahead was going to be good when a mech had three very attractive femmes draped over his body like overly supple metallic felines.

Optimus Prime grunted softly. His left leg twitched where Arcee's purple form had entwined her arms around his upper thigh and was recharging comfortably with her face lovingly turned into his metal. The red Arcee bot was curled up against his chest, fitting herself in nicely to the curve of his imposing armored body. She liked it there. It was close to his spark, and the red femme was more needy that way than the others, she liked personal closeness, not just routine interfacing. The last Arcee bot – the blue femme - was resting against his shoulder with one of her hands inserted stealthily under his armor and lying palm down on his protoform. She was the most sensual of the three. Direct. Always with her processor on the 'kinky' side of what to do with mechs. He had the feeling that if he stood up, all three of the femmes would determinedly hang on, trying to stay oblivious to the fact he was no longer horizontal.

His azure optics swept back and forth silently in their casings, studying the female Autobots. Each femme had their favourite way of doing things – 'things' meaning how they conducted themselves around him. Case in point; each femme gravitated each recharge cycle into their favourite position. Lying on or against his chest, legs, or shoulder, and not at all inclined to let go if someone else tried to shove in.

If there was one thing Optimus Prime always insisted upon no matter what accommodations he was currently in, it was having a very large recharge berth to sink down onto at the end of the day. He didn't allow much time to himself. Didn't want worshipping, molly-coddling, rank privileges, or special attention because of his status as Supreme Commander of the Autobot forces. He carried out the duties of his position with strenuous attention to taking care of each and every bot under his command. _They_ came first. His own needs were not so important.

...but woe-betide any supply officer that assigned a recharge berth anything less than bloody enormous to his personal quarters. They'd get a glare they'd never forget.

Prime worked hard. He was regularly pushing his body and spark to the limit, and whatever recharge he could get had to be of good quality; to aid this, his berth was padded and on the far side of huge to allow for the limbs of his massive physique to relax without fear of running out of room. In colder environments his berth was also heated, but here on Earth at the NEST base the climate was comfortably warm enough for that not to be necessary.

Optimus would also never speak of it out loud, but certain bodily positions with femmes on board demanded lots of space to stretch out comfortably.

Looking back down at the femmes, he began to orchestrate a plan of action to get out from under his femme entourage. He needed to be on duty. While murmuring a sincere repetitive quiet rumble of 'excuse me', 'my apologies' and 'my bad', he managed to get upright without resorting to offensive tactics. Once standing, he looked at the femmes over his shoulder. Only the purple one gave him a disgruntled look, sending a quick disgruntled pouty expression his way before she sank back into recharge.

He smiled at her and left his quarters with rhythmic strides. He was always up early. Obviously not everyone in his army appreciated that fact. Someone human was also up early this morning.

"Morning, big guy."

"Good morning, Major," Optimus responded politely, dipping his head and watching Major Will Lennox jog past the Autobot hangar. On reflex, Optimus checked behind the man to see if he was being chased by Ratchet. Nope. No obnoxious Hummer carrying a huge bucket of water and venting lurid curses was threatening the early morning peace.

Prime turned from watching the Major and continued walking towards the main communications hangar. It was close to the human celebrations of Christmas time, and while many soldiers on base had taken a few days leave to be with their families (with their communications links switched on and always ready to return to base and jump into action at any report of Decepticon activity – Megatron wouldn't care one iota about time off for human religious holidays, in fact, the Decepticon tyrant would cackle manically with eagerness to squish humans on their time off) Optimus and the other Autobots still carried on with their regular duties, aided by the skeletal staff still manning the base.

"Optimus?"

The Autobot Commander halted and turned back to face the human man. "Yes Major?"

Uncharacteristically, Lennox kept his head back down for a moment, obviously carefully considering his next words while the giant alien next to him waited patiently. He then looked back up at his friend and fellow soldier, squinting in the dawn light.

"Would you care for a swim this morning? Before you go on duty? I know you guys _do_ swim, I haven't seen you do it, but..." Lennox shrugged, "I was thinking of heading down to the beach for a quick dip. Would you like to come?" He wasn't sure if he was crossing an invisible line with this or not. Would Optimus reject him or agree with his proposal?

Optimus Prime himself was not disturbed or shocked by the question. He was honored that the man would ask. "I do believe that Sargent Epps reported seeing sharks last week – is this the reason for your request?" he asked with a smile, allowing the handle of the intimidating rifle on his back to peek out from his shoulder strut while he crossed his arms over his chest to appear menacing.

Will snorted a laugh, "Oh come on, you think I can't take care of some disgruntled marine life by myself? I can shoot, you know. No, no, I just thought that a morning swim can be a good way to begin the day. Besides, if I wanted protection I'd go and get Ironhide's aft out of recharge, but honestly, I think watching a Great White shark flying through the air as fish and chips would not be so amusing. Sharks have the right to live their lives too."

It took Optimus a moment to reference what on Cybertron the man was talking about, but he understood. "I would need to have a serious conversation with Ironhide if he turned any sentient life form into 'fish and chips', Major. And my answer is yes, a swim does sound enticing, and I would like to join you," he glanced up at the sun beginning to peek over the horizon, "especially since it looks like we will be enduring another day of extreme temperatures."

"Excellent!" Will slapped his hands together. "Let me just go and fetch my stuff."

It didn't take more than a few minutes for the strange pair to reach their destination after Will had changed into a pair of swimming shorts, even quicker when Prime had insisted on scooping up the man and carrying him with long fast strides to the coastline and the small secluded beach not far from the base.

The Autobot Leader stood on the beach with his hands on his hips and did a quick scan of the water for sharks and other life forms. Pleased to find the absence of anything other than a few harmless teeny fish in the shallows, he nodded at Will. "All clear, Major."

With a boyish grin, Lennox jogged down the beach and waded/leapt through the knee deep water until a wave broke and he dived underneath it, popping up on the other side and beginning to swim strenuously. Cautious of the man's safety, Optimus chose to follow him, walking in without fear, the liquid parting easily for his immensely strong thighs. The water was crystal clear and soothing on his metallic skin. He kept moving in until it came up to just below his chest, then stood still with his optics tracking the progress of Will as he made haphazard laps up and down the waves. Lifting one hand and cupping some of the water, he allowed it to slowly trickle through his fingers, thinking. This substance was what had once entombed his brother; Megatron; in the deepest depths of the ocean. Dark. Alien. A lonely and depressing place. His optics darkened. It had been the best place for containment and concealment of his brother's dead shell the humans could provide, but even so, he had risen from his tomb, and was once more a deadly threat. Would his menace never cease?

"Optimus!"

Prime lifted his head from contemplation to stare down at Will who was floating next to him and hanging onto his hip armor.

Will's wet brow furrowed, "Are you okay?"

"Of course, I was merely processing some stray thoughts, something I do too much of, Ratchet has informed me. Here," with gentle fingers Optimus lifted Will up to his shoulder and set him carefully upon it. "Do you know how to dive?"

Lennox smiled in response, getting to his feet on the flat parts of Prime's armor and dripping water down his body. "Do I ever..."

Optimus laughed as the man flipped himself off his shoulder in a graceful tumbling dive. Will took advantage of Prime's height and assistance, making many more dives and bombs. When Lennox had tired of the game, Optimus waded back into the shallows, and lay down on his back, propped up on his elbows, relaxing with the water just barely covering his lengthy body. Will dog-paddled in circles around him for a while, enjoying himself. To see someone as deadly and awesome as Optimus Prime laid out on the beach without a care in the world, with water lapping at his metallic armor as it sparkled in the sun, was quite a sight. Knowing - and having seen - that the Autobot could go from relaxed to seriously dangerous and bristling with firepower in the blink of an eye made Will shudder.

"Do you mind if I ask you a question?"

Prime cocked his head to make optic contact with Lennox. "That depends on what it is you wish to ask."

Will put on his best innocent expression, "About Arcee. And you."

"Ah." Prime looked out to sea. "I was wondering when this would come up."

Will waded over to the Autobot and leaned on his lower leg. "I don't want to ask anything too rude, and I'm not sure what is considered rude in your culture so please stop me if I offend you."

Prime's optics swivelled back to Lennox, "I am not easily offended, Major. Please ask what ever it is that is bothering you."

Will sucked in a deep breath and smiled. Finally! He was going to get some answers from the man – MECH! - himself! _Will, my man, don't stuff this up, you just got an early Christmas present! _

**TO BE CONTINUED NEXT CHAPTER... :-)**


	10. Chapter 10

**Male Is As Male Does**

**Chapter 10**

Major Will Lennox couldn't believe his luck. He'd somehow stumbled upon the perfect situation to ask Optimus Prime all about his 'duties' and his relationship with 'his' femmes. For a few moments his brain was too busy gasping out 'guh' to think of anything intelligent to ask.

Optimus didn't move from his position on his back in the breaking waves, watching the Major gather himself together. He idly commed Ratchet to inform him that he was 'spilling it', and received back several warnings not to break the humans brains, and that you couldn't re-boot them by picking them up, shaking them or pressing a magical button on their aft's.

"Do you really own all of the Autobot women?"

Prime returned his attention to Lennox. The Major was still leaning on his leg, wearing a quizzical expression. "Well... technically, yes. I do. They are referred to as femmes, not women. I did not originally 'own' them, when I became Prime I refused to follow the old traditions and absolved the femmes of any loyalty to me at all."

"Uh huh." Lennox blinked, then lifted one eyebrow. "So... how many do you have?"

Optimus shook his head slightly, appearing downcast, "A more appropriate question would be, how many have I _lost_, Major." His optics roved the horizon, not wishing to stare down the small man with the weight of his feelings. "Many of Cybertron's femmes were exterminated. Slaughtered. Including my first lover."

"Woah..." Lennox held up his hands, backing up, realising what the Autobot Leader was saying, "That's... I just, um," he grimaced, then his shoulders slumped. Defeated. "You have my complete and utter sympathy. I can't imagine anything worse. The Decepticons?"

"The Decepticons..." Prime murmured, his optics blazing with quiet unforgivable fury. "More specifically, Megatron."

There was silence between the two males – Lennox digesting what he'd just learned, and Prime trying not to open old painful memories. Optimus slowly sat up, resting his elbows on his knees, head hanging down, mouthplates set firmly, his optics watching his hands open and flex between his legs. Will moved off into the shallows next to him, hands on his own hips, frowning. The sea continued to ebb and flow at low level around their legs.

"What was her name?"

The Autobot Commander had been expecting that query. If Lennox wished to know what was going on, he would also need to know about... _her_. He was comfortable with the Major knowing, since he had proven himself as a brilliant and loyal solider, and more importantly, as a good friend. Putting himself on the line again and again to protect and aid the Autobots in any way he could. He lifted his head, his optics glittering.

"Her name was Elita One. It was at her request that I embrace the old traditions of Cybertron, and take upon myself the mantle of protecting and nurturing the femmes – particularly the Autobot femmes – when Megatron began exterminating the females. We had hoped such a move on my part would protect the femmes from Megatron, because to touch them would be an act of war against me, but none of us ever expected him to be so ruthless... and so swift. In hindsight, I may have made the situation worse. He was killing them to get at me." He looked up into the dawn sky wistfully. "It was Elita's last wish that I protect other females from the fate that eventually would claim her as well." His head sank slowly down. "She was murdered by a unit from one of Megatron's personal battalions before we could pledge ourselves together as sparkmates. If she had lived, we would have been bonded together for all eternity. That opportunity was stolen from us."

Will drew in a harsh breath. He didn't know what to say. What DID one say to a being who had lost his part of his soul and was doomed to carry the knowledge of that loss for thousands of years?

"I'm sorry."

"Thank you." Prime quietly shunted his terrible memories back into his deepest memory tracks. He never kept them open for long. "In terms of how many femmes I have now? Well..." his mouthplates quirked up into a wry smile, "that depends on whether you count Arcee as one femme or three."

That got a light chuckle out of the Major. "Yeah, I see what you mean. If even you have trouble figuring that out, I don't feel so bad that I don't have a handle on it yet either."

"Mmm. I must confess, I sometimes find myself at a loss for how to handle them as well." He rubbed a big hand on the back of his helmeted head and rolled his optics, "Of course, Ironhide has many _suggestions_."

Will laughed, glad the tension from Prime's earlier words had lifted, "Oh, I bet he does! I know very well that he thinks of himself as God's gift to women – er, _femmes_."

Optimus broke into heavy laughter at that statement, pointing a finger, "Would it make you happy to know that I placed him in charge of training the femmes in my army? He is very talented in that area."

When Will went wide-eyed and began to choke and cough, Optimus realised his mistake. He sighed and squinted down at the human. "I apologise Will, I did mean training in weapons and self-defence, not... other types of training involving personal relationships."

The Major wiped his mouth and sent Optimus an evil look, "Sure you did, and I suppose this other type of training is your 'area'?"

"Walked into that one, didn't I?" Prime muttered back at him, leaning back on his arms once again and relaxing, flexing his chest and arms. "Ironhide can be a crude mech at the best of times, but he has a genuine love of femmes, and they in turn seem to love him as well. He makes a great protector and teacher, most of our femmes were trained by him and as you well know, Arcee is our best sharpshooter. She was his protege." Optimus nodded slowly at his own words. "When the femmes needed advice or help, they were happy to turn to him for it. He welcomed them."

This comment had Will snickering again. Optimus rolled his optics, smiling.

"I will attempt to stop with the innuendo, Major."

"You started it," Lennox shot back.

Prime grunted, sifting sand through his hands and watching the water.

Will just grinned and crossed his arms expectantly. "Ratchet was very kind in explaining what happens between mech's and femmes, YOUR area, apparently. And before you go blaming Ratchet, you started this, you haven't exactly been very secretive about your liaisons with Arcee. Epps and I have been mashing our brains trying to work out what's been going on." The human soldier stared Optimus down with raised eyebrows and a slightly ticked off expression.

Optimus had the decency to appear contrite, lowering his gaze, musing. "I should have explained myself earlier, perhaps. The reason why I did not was merely to avoid causing you embarrassment and confusion since some races on the planets we have come across in our travels were very affronted by the open intimacy our species possesses."

"HA! You did that _without_ telling us."

"Very well." Optimus sat up once more, folding his long legs crosswise in front of him and resting his hands palm side down on his knees. Lennox had wondered if the bots were able to execute such a pose – now he knew. They were surprisingly flexible and agile for such huge 'rigid metal' beings, in fact, in most respects they were more flexible than the humans. "Would you like for me to explain the role of a Prime in Cybertronian society?"

"YES!" Lennox practically shrieked.

"Thought so..." the large mech chuckled, his optics blinking. "Hmm." Prime scratched a finger down the side of his metal cheek, thinking. "A lot of the history concerning femmes was held by the Allspark, so I do not know every detail, but I can tell you a few things. It was rumored that the first Prime's - including the Fallen – created the femmes. There is some debate that this is not true, but it was so many millions of years ago that verifying it with hard evidence either way is impossible. It does make some sense that they did because it was the first sons of the originals that began the tradition to claim ownership of the femmes. These son's wrote the laws that proclaimed their ownership of Cybertronian females, saying it was the duty of a Prime to provide shelter, energon, medical support, protection and guidance to all females. In exchange, the femmes were to offer themselves as personal attendants to the Prime. In all respects."

Lennox didn't move from his lean on Prime's leg, looking up at the Alien Commander. "It unsettles me to think of someone claiming that they 'own' someone else, especially if the claimee doesn't wish to BE claimed, and why would you want to own someone else anyway? It's just hard work."

Optimus blinked his optic shutters at him, the interlocking metal plates of his face moving and sliding to produce his expressions. "Those are my feelings as well. My personal belief is that freedom is the right of all sentient beings." The mech went quiet for a moment, considering his next words. "I do adhere to that, Major. My femmes have always had the freedom to do as they pleased, I do not give them orders unless they have personally consented to it. You could say it is the other way around," he laughed, shaking his head at himself, "THEY own me. I offer them anything they may need or wish for – protection, support, security. Anything within reason."

"But that can't be right, I've seen you giving Arcee orders," Will queried him, confused.

"Yes. Those that asked to be soldiers in my army did so of their own free will, and have made it their clear wish to be treated as the mech's are – trained, issued orders, and – sadly – given their lives in battle."

"You offer them _anything_?" Will said incredulously, not believing it. If his wife knew about this, she would be demanding the same treatment! Or wanting to become one of Prime's females!

"Anything that I can reasonably provide." Prime smiled faintly at him. "Including my berth, Major. That is one point in which I differ from my predecessors. Many of them cajoled or outright demanded the femmes onto their berths, they had lurid reputations of being voracious and insatiable lovers. No femme has ever been on my berth out of anything other than her own free will to do so. I never ask or demand it. In any form."

"So, Arcee... you haven't been insisting she stays in your room?" asked the Major, cocking his head.

"No, never. All three of her want to." At this Optimus began to look uncomfortable. He looked down at the sand and trailed one of his hands through the water. "I am not ignorant of my own physical attractiveness as a mech, I have been told many times that I am, er," Prime rubbed the side of his head, bashful, "gorgeous. This - combined with the power of my position as Autobot Commander – makes me very desirable to them." He frowned comically at himself, lifting his wide shoulders in a metal shrug, "In fact, I have been chased by females of many different species during my travels. It can be disturbing."

"I've heard your noises," Will pointed a stiff finger at him with a haughty smirk, "you enjoy it. Don't act like you don't."

At this, Optimus tried to suppress a smug grin, and failed. His blue optics glowed down at Lennox. "I do enjoy it when I have the time. What male would not? To be desired by the opposite gender is something all individuals want. The femmes appreciate me, they like what I do for them, I haven't had any complaints about my conduct on the berth."

"Oh really? That confident about your own prowess, are we? And I don't suppose you being good on your back has anything to do with being BIG, does it? Over-sized where it counts? Compared to us, you must be enormous," Will playfully prodded him, trying to defend the pride of all human men.

"Size is not such an issue," Prime brushed off his attempt at getting too personal, "if you are asking about my abilities, there are others equally as adept. I am not the only Autobot mech who enjoys femmes."

"What?" Lennox said bluntly, squinting up at him from under his drying blonde fringe of hair.

"Ironhide refers to the blue Arcee as 'Chromia'. She now only recharges with me, she does everything else with Ironhide, if you know what I mean. Very discrete," Optimus winked, blinking one optic, "see if you can give him some grief about that, he has been keeping secrets from you, Major."

"Ironhide with... with... oh, _man_, is he in trouble!" Will growled, slapping one hand against Prime's metal. "That double-crossing, devious, son of a toaster! Him! With an Arcee bot! How did I miss that?! Mister 'Oh-Will, I-wish-I-had-a-femme' already _has_ one!"

Optimus leaned forward and spluttered with laughter. "Ah, we need to keep some issues to ourselves, do we not?"

"Humph." Will crossed his arms sharply over his chest, pouting. "I thought we were, you know, close. He's going to find himself with flat wheels and sand in his tank tomorrow morning."

Prime lifted one optic arch, holding his hand out next to the man. "Mmm. Oh, Will, please step onto my hand."

"What? Why?"

The Autobot Commander pointed a metal finger from his other hand behind the Major, saying simply, "Shark."

"HOLY SHIT~!"

Lennox scrambled to safety on the Autobot's open palm, looking over his shoulder to see the fin of what looked like a humongous shark swimming in zig-zag's in the shallow water several body lengths away, its ominous length darkening the sand underneath it. Optimus wasn't concerned, staying on his back in the water with his hand in the air holding Will. He did look surprised when the shark made a sudden lunge and swam straight at his leg with a wide open mouth, making an attack. It hit hard and bounced off Prime's alien Cybertronian armor.

"Strange creature. Very aggressive," Optimus commented calmly, watching the shark back off and shake its head from side to side before twitching its tail and swimming rapidly away.

Will watched on with wide eyes, not amused. "It didn't like a taste of you! That's a White Pointer. It's bloody big. I think we should warn the rest of the staff about swimming here without an Autobot on guard duty."

"Yes. Just don't use Wheelie as a potential guard, he'll get swallowed right before you do." Optimus studied the man crouching in his palm. "Where did you get those shorts from? They are very unsettling to my optics."

"Ratchet." Will huffed, still watching where the shark went. "He was playing a joke."

"Oh, about your small penis size? Yes, I heard about that. Have you considered surgery?"

"OPTIMUS!"


	11. Chapter 11

**Male Is As Male Does**

Authors Note: Thank you for all the reviews, alerts and favorites. All are gratefully appreciated and loved. If anyone has ideas they'd like to see in the next chapter or two, post them in a review and I'll see what I can do. I need some inspiration. One reviewer wanted to see the femmes spread out among the mech's, so I gave Blue Arcee to Ironhide.

**Chapter 11**

"Why didn't you shoot it?"

"It did not require shooting, Ironhide."

"You lay there and let it _bite_ at you? What's wrong with your processor?"

"Not a thing. I don't shoot at things just because they try to bite my leg off. _You_, on the other hand..."

Standing serenely at the enormous feet of Optimus Prime and Ironhide as they bickered (or, Ironhide bickered, Optimus just parried with him), Lennox and Epps looked up at the giant Autobots and made amused expressions. Will had his hands behind his back while he rocked back and forth on his heels, he'd ditched Ratchet's shorts and was kitted out in his fatigues with a short sleeved white t-shirt. Epps was similarly attired, and had his hands on his hips and his lips pursed. Big robots fighting was something they didn't get involved in, unless the robots bore Decepticon symbols, then every weapon came out firing. For Optimus and Ironhide having a biff – they'd take a coffee break. And a donut break, if the bitching went on long enough.

The arrogant demand in Ironhide's voice was toxic. He could not believe Optimus had been given the option of taking down – well, blowing _up – _an aggressive organic, and he had taken the alternative of letting the pompous thing maul his leg without payback.

"Grrr... disgraceful," Ironhide stabbed one very brave finger into Prime's chestplates, making the bigger mech lean back slightly, "don't ever put my human in danger like that again," then he swung around on one foot away from his amused Leader, jerking his head. "Come, Will."

"I'm coming," Lennox grinned up at his aggrieved friend and trotted after him, waving 'ta-ta's' to Epps, who stayed next to Prime. Epps leaned one hand on Prime's ankle and waved goodbye.

Ironhide had put quite a distance between himself and his human friend before Lennox's annoyed yell of 'HEY!' made him slow down. The black mech eventually halted and swivelled his optics down to Will's running and panting form.

"Run faster," Ironhide said shortly, "I don't walk that slow."

Will lifted up a hand to make a fist and punch Ironhide's leg and then dropped it, thinking better of it. His hand would break into pieces before the shine on Ironhide's armor was even vaguely dulled.

"You know, I can take care of myself," he said, pointing a stiff finger up at the Autobot's face. "I could've grabbed the shark by its tail and dragged it up onto the beach..."

Ironhide dropped himself down onto one knee, getting up close and personal with the Major. Metal face plates to Will's sweaty mottled skin. His face remained completely expressionless, his mouthplates saying nothing, until one optic ridge slowly quirked up in a 'really?' gesture.

"... or not." Will grumbled, looking down at his feet, knowing he'd been caught with a bluff. Tough solider he may be, but there was no human man tough enough on Earth to grab a live Great White by the tail and strand it on the beach for display.

Ironhide's rarely heard booming laughter rattled the windows on the buildings around them. He looked fondly down at his best friend. "Ah Will, you always amuse me."

"Huh." Lennox crossed his arms, scowling. He didn't like having Ironhide think that he needed 'protecting'. He wasn't a pet. A bright idea lit up his brain. "I know who ELSE amuses you too. Someone _blue_. With a motorcycle transformation. Someone of the opposite sex to you."

Ironhide stopped smiling and stared at Will in shock. "What?"

"Someone called, hmm, what was it? Ah yes... Chromia."

Ironhide almost toppled over backwards in shock. His jaw hung open. He held his hands spread out in front of him. "You... but... that's..."

Will's manic grin almost split his face. "You've got a girl, Ironhide, and you've been hiding her right under my nose. How sneaky of you. I thought we didn't keep secrets from each other?"

The Weapons Specialist growled, and jerked upright, his hands clenching and clenching into fists. "Slag it."

"So..." Will tapped a finger to his lips, "did she think those wonderful big cannons of yours equate to something _equally_ as big under your pelvic armor? Is that how your attract your women, 'Hide?"

"Not here," Ironhide groused roughly, scooping up the man in one swift swipe with his thick black arms, causing Will to yell, and striding off into the nearest vacant building his scanners said was safe. Lennox found himself plopped down inelegantly onto his feet while Ironhide dragged the hangar door partially shut. Finally, he stomped back over to Will and stood in front of him, glaring, his optics glowing with a sinister gleam in the dull light of the confines of the hangar.

"How do you know about Chromia?" he demanded.

Lennox wasn't worried. He knew he could push Ironhide's buttons hard before the mech would explode. He stood his ground calmly. Most other men would've been squealing for help with a mech like Ironhide leaning over them and growling. "I have my sources, 'Hide, all good army men do."

"Is this source tall, covered in flames, transforms into a garbage truck and goes by the tag of 'slaghead'?"

Will grinned, "If you're talking about Prime-"

"Pit, I knew it," Ironhide face-palmed, rubbing his noseplates into the centre of his hand.

"-then yeah, he told me. What's wrong with that? You deserve a good woman, Ironhide," Will's expression softened, "you're a good mech, I'm happy for you. I just wish you'd told me yourself."

Ironhide removed his hand from his face and grunted softly. "You don't mind...?"

Will's brow furrowed questioningly, "Why would I?"

"Humph. I just thought," Ironhide's optics glinted for a moment as he pondered, then he grunted again, "Nevermind." He started for the hangar door, believing their conversation to be over, then stopped and muttered to himself in Cybertronian. He looked over his bulky shoulder at Will. "Did Prime tell you anything ELSE that could be considered sensitive information?"

Will's mouth hung open as he took a breath, inflating his chest. "Yeah. He told me rather a lot actually, not that I'd repeat any of it to anyone else."

Ironhide's optics darkened. One optic ridge quirked up. "Really."

"Really! You know, confidential matters! Things that he'd only tell someone with authority AND intelligence, you know?"

The Autobot mech turned around to face his friend, then merely stared at Lennox, waiting. An immobile black scary lump with glowing eyes. One of his cannons creaked. Dust notes floating in a sharp ray of sunlight coming in via a crack in the hangar door settled onto one of his planted feet.

"Okay, _okay_," Will groused mildly, waving his hands, "as if I could ever keep anything from you. There is one thing he said that would interest you."

"And that is?"

"He says he's good with the femmes, good in a way that femmes would enjoy. On his berth."

Ironhide gaped at the Major, his optics flickering – then let loose with deep stuttering laughter, the sound rolling up from deep within his chest. "Does he now? He's been peddling that slag ever since he became Prime! Thought he'd gotten over that. Hn. Perhaps not. Sure, he's good – if you like the kind of techniques he's using, he's getting outdated now. He's not as good as some other mech's, Will. Keep that in your processor."

"Uh..." Will thought about that, looking down awkwardly at the toes of his beige army boots. Did he want to know? He could tell by the glint in Ironhide's optic that the mech was referring to himself as some sort of robotic sex machine. He thought about Ironhide's thick black arms around a femme, those big silver topped hands poking and prodding the enticing curves of a femme's body, Ironhide's stocky hips settling between the thighs of the femme so he could - no, no, go to your happy place, find your happy place, _where is the happy place?!_

"Did he tell you what the first Prime's asked him to do just before Sam resurrected him?" Ironhide asked, cocking his head, big hands perched on his angular hips.

"No! No." Focus Will. "Wha - what did they say?"

"Humph, nothing much, they were just disappointed that Optimus hadn't reproduced yet despite all the activity he'd been participating in." Ironhide looked very self satisfied that Optimus had gotten himself in trouble with _his_ bosses. "They were insisting that he stopped playing around and produced a sparkling. They don't want us to ever be in the situation again of being without a Prime."

Lennox winced at 'Hide's crudeness. "Uh huh. Right. I had been discussing the exact same thing with Epps, actually. We figured that out too. I didn't dare bring it up with the Big Guy himself though. I mean," he shrugged lightly, "it isn't easy to produce a child on command, especially in the middle of a war, and _especially_ one that the enemy will make their number one target. That's harsh on Prime. It's not as if he hasn't made enough sacrifices already."

"Yeah." Ironhide rolled his big shoulders, acutely remembering bringing up Bumblebee in the early stages of Cybertron's war. "But forgive me if I don't feel bad that he's being ordered to interface even more than he already is. That's a luxury most mech's would kill for."

"Including you?" Will asked dryly.

The smirk on Ironhide's face was heavy. "I don't need to kill for it. Femmes appreciate me for who I am, not for whatever fancy 'Prime' title I have attached to my name." The mech dropped his voice down an octave, lowering his head, "...I've never needed props to pump up my mechness."

"Oh yes, right, sure you don't," Will rolled his eyes and made for the hangar door with long strides. He couldn't take any more macho-ness, he needed to get outside. He waved a dismissive hand at Ironhide as he passed him by, "Go and have fun with Chromia. I'll issue a directive to my men to not let Optimus Prime's assets get shot off in the field. Protect the Prime family jewels at all costs. Christ." Shaking his head, he jogged off across the tarmac.

_**Later that night...**_

Optimus Prime came awake to having only two femmes on his recharge berth – and both of them were making mewling noises and jerking in their recharge. The red Arcee was hanging onto his chestplates with determined hands while her hips twitched. The purple Arcee was almost strangling his waist with a very tight hold of both her arms around it, her legs scissoring and spreading. Prime sighed inaudibly, shifting his body minutely on the berth and reaching down to pat both of them reassuringly, using soothing strokes.

He lay back and waited for the femmes to calm down. It took another fifteen Earth minutes before both femmes went absolutely stiff, arched their backs, then flopped down and sagged onto his body. Both of their air intakes heaved with stress. The red Arcee onlined her optics and looked up at him wearily, blinking. Her purple sister rubbed at her face and grumbled. Optimus watched both of them.

"I will have a talk with Ironhide and see if he can restrict his activities to only one night per week. I cannot have both of you – and myself – being dragged out of recharge every second night like this," Optimus murmured, running his hand over the back of the red Arcee's head.

"Chromia is enjoying herself. Ironhide is..." the red Arcee grimaced, not liking what she was about to say, her sweet voice sounding frustrated, "very good, despite his idle boasting."

"Mmm." Optimus lay himself down fully on his back, stretching his spinal strut out and staring at the ceiling with softly glowing optics. Both femmes shifted around to settle comfortably against him. He caressed them absently, thinking. "If you request it, I can see to it that Chromia receives your feedback tomorrow night and then Ironhide will not recharge well either. You only have to ask."

"Not tomorrow night, the night after. That I will look forward to," the red Arcee answered from under his windscreen.

Ironhide was; in not-so-intimate terms; revving up Chromia's spark with his night time activities, and because the Arcee femmes were all one third each of Arcee's original spark, whatever sensations one femme experienced were sent as throbbing echoes to her sisters – and Ironhide was not shy in using his talents on their sister to make all of their sparks scream with pleasurable feedback.

The red Arcee dragged herself up Prime's chest so that her face popped up in front of his. Her optics narrowed at him. "He is not better than you," she stated firmly, dragging a delicate fingertip down his noseplates and around his mouth, appreciating his handsome looks, "he is too coarse for my tastes, no matter how good his hands are."

"Thank you," Optimus chuckled, stroking her slim back with his over-sized hand. "I'll be sure to relay that remark to Ironhide as payback."

Red Arcee snorted and splayed herself back out over his chest, sinking into recharge.

The room was silent and peaceful with all three of the berth occupants on the brink of recharge when a surge of emotion made both Arcee bots jerk and shiver. Red Arcee cursed loudly. Purple Arcee groaned, clutching at her armor covering her spark.

Optimus Prime sighed, lifting one heavy arm and rubbing at his face, muttering, "Ironhide, give it a rest. Twice in one night is pushing it."

A sudden crash and a high-pitched yelp that sounded like Ironhide and a startled yell from Chromia made them all look at each other.

"IRONHIDE! If I have to listen to any more of that, I'll put you into stasis lock! Got it?! Prime's bad enough! Some of us want to recharge _peacefully_!"

The sound of stomping frustrated bot footsteps and a slamming door made Optimus chuckle. "Ah, thank you Ratchet, I couldn't have done it better myself." He could imagine the looks on Ironhide and Chromia's faceplates when Ratchet sprang them mid-coitus. Payback was sweet.


	12. Chapter 12

**Male Is As Male Does**

Authors Note: There is some deep innuendo and sexual talk involving the Transformers (without any sex acts) in this chapter. Just a warning before anyone goes wading through this and gets shocked.

**Chapter 12**

_**NEST base, Optimus Prime's quarters, early next morning...**_

"Look what the mechanocat dragged in..." the purple Arcee remarked as their missing sister opened the door.

Chromia had spent the night with the black brooding mech, Ironhide and her activities had not gone unnoticed by the others. Red Arcee and Purple Arcee had felt every overload Ironhide had been able to get out of their sister, and Optimus – by default, since the femmes were on his berth – had been kept out of recharge by it. Ratchet's room was sandwiched between that of Prime and Ironhide, and he had not been impressed with all the grunting, squealing and thumping - barging into Ironhide's room and yelling for them to cut it out. It hadn't been too embarrassing for Ironhide and Chromia to be caught. It had been annoying, but not an 'Oh God' moment, since Ratchet was their medic he had seen plenty of what both of them had to offer in the intimacy department, he just hadn't seen it 'in use', is all.

Purple Arcee propped herself up on one elbow and watched Blue Arcee – 'Chromia' – come waltzing back into Optimus Prime's room, her hips swaying and a satisfied look on her faceplates that could only have been put there by a very good mech. Their much-loved Commander had left earlier as he always did, but his femmes stayed lounging and recharging on his giant recharge berth. Unless they had a mission there was no need for them to be up at dawn.

Red Arcee sat up against the wall and pulled her knees up to her chest, giving Chromia a welcoming smile. "Hey Blue. Enjoy yourself?"

"You know I did," Chromia grinned, pointing one finger at a wide black mark left on her upper chassis, "and you can help me buff this out. Ironhide is a lot rougher than Optimus is."

Purple Arcee exchanged looks with Red Arcee. "Rougher? Yes, we noticed. You two kept Optimus up as well, since we couldn't be quiet about the feedback we were getting. C'mon, take a load off and give us details." Purple patted the empty space next to her where Optimus had previously been lying, inviting Chromia to chit chat.

With a groan and a pleased sigh, Chromia hopped up onto the berth and leaned back on the wall next to Red Arcee. She stretched her legs out, allowing the wheel halves embedded in her calves to prop them up. For a moment she was silent, pleasant memories flooding her processor. Really, they were so lucky to be with the Autobots, the mechs were beyond nice. Good looking, kind, experienced... who in the pit would want to put up with the Decepticons when there were mech's like Optimus Prime and Ironhide around for the taking?

"You've got more marks on your hips," Purple Arcee said mildly, "here," the femme unsubspaced a small silver tin of cleanser and a patch of nylon cloth, putting the two together and gently rubbing away at her marked sister.

"Thank you..." Chromia shuttered her optics, shunting air out of her filters and relaxing while her sister buffed her.

Red Arcee nudged her, "Talk while she cleans."

"Talk," Chromia snorted, shaking her head, "Ironhide doesn't talk much, he's all about the hands on action. By Primus... I know you two like Optimus, hey, I do too, but, wow. 'Hide is good. Amazing, in fact."

"Oh, so it's 'Hide' now, is it?"

Chromia gave her red sister a smirk, "Ironhide is a mouthful, just like Optimus Prime is."

Purple Arcee looked up with a shocked expression, "He's bigger than Optimus?!"

Chromia was quick on the uptake, "Nope, not that kind of mouthful. If you really want to know that kind of detail, he is, um, a touch thicker, but not longer, and he curves to the right a bit, whereas Optimus is perfectly straight. I think he's been damaged there actually, it has a few scars on it, I'm sure that's why it curves. I meant to ask him, but he kept me too busy."

"Oh, ouch. What a place to get hit, the poor bot, he must of terminated whoever did it, you know what Ironhide is like, he would've been on a rampage," Purple said, nodding, and went back to her rigorous cleaning.

"I like him." Chromia said bluntly, her metal mouthplates forming the best pout they could.

"Like?" Red cocked her head, appraising her sister. "As in, 'sparkmate' like?"

Chromia nodded, her optics brightening.

"Don't go there sweetspark, you know that's complicated for us to do, and Optimus doesn't always give permission for that," Red pointed out. "Besides, with so many mech's around here, why would you settle on just one?"

Chromia didn't reply to that. She was staring down with affection at the black mark on her upper chest that Purple Arcee hadn't gotten up to yet. She wanted to leave that black mark there as a reminder of Ironhide's affections, but she knew that the other mechs would guess what it was. She didn't want to cause a stir.

"Are you going back there tonight?"

"I might, if Optimus says I can," Chromia grinned, pushing down off the wall to lie on her back and pillow her arms under her head. "And you know what? 'Hide likes to interface with his cannon's charged up and spinning. I had one either side of my head humming away when he was on top."

Purple Arcee jerked her hands back from cleaning, "_What? _I hope he had the safeties on!"

Chromia flicked an indulgent hand at her sister, "Of course he does, it wouldn't do him any good to blow up a femme he's connected to, now would it?"

"I wish Optimus had big arm cannons," Red Arcee whined, "I'm over him wearing his rifle on his back on the berth. It's not as kinky as it used to be."

"...Ratchet has his giant arm saws..." Purple Arcee murmured quietly, humming to herself.

Her sisters gave her equal looks of 'a-ha'.

"What?" she looked at them indignantly, "Chromia has Ironhide, I'd like to give Ratchet a try if Optimus says I can. I like him, have you seen the way he moves his hips when he walks? How can you not say a supple body like that doesn't make you want him? He's gorgeous!" Purple Arcee argued.

She had been waiting until the time was right to bring up her interest in the Autobot's CMO. Rumour had it that he was an absolute legend on the berth. She found her optics wandering his way more and more often, and if Prime had been agreeable about letting Chromia be with Ironhide, she didn't see why she couldn't give Ratchet a try. Yes, all three of them would always belong to Optimus, but their Commander knew he couldn't keep their interest forever, their optics were bound to wander to other males. Prime was the absolute BEST, they knew that, but by nature the femmes would naturally want to test out other mechs too.

Chromia leaned over and poked Purple Arcee hard in the arm, "Just don't creep into his room in the middle of the night and surprise him, he might use those sexy saws to whip your head off, okay?"

"You know Optimus has the better body, and he's nicer. He does the best cuddles, too. Just about everything he does is the best. Ratchet gets angry, I couldn't take his temper," Red Arcee added, "but go ahead if you want to. We'll know how good he is by what the feedback is like. There is one thing though, neither Ratchet or Ironhide use diesel for their alt modes, so there won't be any of those ungodly muffler fluffs that Optimus does sometimes when he's recharging."

Chromia covered her noseplates, "Oh Primus yes. Those suck."

_**Later that afternoon...**_

"About time Sam came for a visit. Anyone would think he didn't like us army-types any more," Epps said with a grin, holding one hand up to shield his eyes from the sun while watching the C17 begin its landing approach.

"I agree," Optimus Prime cocked his head in answer to Epps, his optics also on the plane, "it will indeed be pleasant to have Bumblebee, Sam and Mikaela around again. I have missed them."

The engines of the huge plane roared under the reverse thrust of the engines controlling its descent. Once all of the wheels had touched down the Autobot Leader noticeably relaxed his stiff stance and seemed to loosen all of his joints. He trusted the humans, he did, but this particular plane was carrying a cargo very precious to him, and having it safely on the ground lifted a weight from his spark.

All of the Autobots were there to greet the new arrivals. Chromia was standing next to Ironhide, one of her hands resting companionably on his hip armor. The Weapons Specialist had his arms folded in a relaxed manner over his immense chest, staring at the plane. Optimus would never open his mouthplates to say so – Ironhide would definitely punch him in the noseplates for it – but the femme and mech looked good together. He wasn't too upset at having the Blue Arcee taking leave from being on his berth every night to shack up with Ironhide, he allowed his femmes any freedom they desired, and besides, it gave him free shots at Ironhide's expense over his activities now that he wasn't the only one with a female to play with.

Red Arcee and Purple Arcee were standing next to the Commander; one either side of him; both occasionally sending Chromia haughty looks with their optic ridges raised at her 'this-one-is-mine' behaviour with the big black mech. They weren't going to let Chromia rest easy with her inexplicable decision of choosing to be with Ironhide over Optimus Prime for a partner.

Sideswipe, Jolt, the Twins (Mudflap and Skids), Ratchet and the new recruit Wheelie all stood together in a loose bunch. The Twins more loosely than the others. They would alternate between standing and making smart remarks at each other to punching each other and wrestling on the ground. Prime growled at them when they got too bad, and Sideswipe wasn't above dealing out a hard smack to the back of their headplates. Jolt just zapped their aft's with one of his electrowhips.

When the plane finally rolled to a stop and lowered its rear ramp, the deep revving of a Camaro engine and the appearance of the yellow sports car with black stripes practically bounding down to the tarmac announced to them all that Bumblebee was back. The humans soldiers broke into raucous clapping and cheering when Bee spun himself into one very wicked but ecstatically happy circle with his wheels blowing up smoke.

Optimus Prime smiled ruefully and cleared his vocaliser with a disapproving tone but found himself doing some muted clapping at the behaviour of his youngest but much loved soldier. He'd reprimand him later over that little stunt.

Bumblebee slid to a stop and popped open his doors, allowing his smugly smiling passengers Sam and Mikaela to emerge. He transformed rapidly while his humans greeted Major Lennox and Epps, snapping an enthusiastic salute to his Commander, Optimus Prime, a vibrant "Hello Sir!" musical clip coming from his speakers. Prime acknowledged him with a chuckle.

"Hello Bumblebee, welcome back. Sam, Mikaela, it is wonderful to see you again. I-"

Prime's monologue was interrupted by all three of the Arcee femmes making a charge for Bumblebee. The yellow mech took a big step backwards, looking alarmed, holding his hands out in a 'stop' motion while making a horrified expression with his faceplates. The Arcee femmes halted uncertainly.

"It's okay Bumblebee," Optimus smiled, crossing his arms over his chest, well aware of how badly the poor mech was about to be tackled. Arcee loved Bumblebee like a younger brother, "the humans know about the femmes and myself now. Go ahead, Arcee."

Relaxing, Bumblebee opened his arms up eagerly, waiting to be jumped on. The femmes didn't disappoint, all three of them piled into his arms for a group hug until Bee had to resort to sitting down with the femmes hanging off him chatting away and petting him like a much loved child. Ironhide let out a growl, not pleased at seeing 'his' Chromia all over another mech, even if it was just Bumblebee.

Sam stood and watched with his eyebrows raised up to his forehead, confused. What the heck? Why was Bee being tackled by the femmes? "Wow. They didn't do that last time he was here. What's going on? Are they, er, girlfriend and boyfriend or something?"

Major Lennox just stood whistling, looking up at the sky and not getting involved. Damned if he was going to inform the boy about the sexual exploits of the alien robots. Epps didn't have any such problems. He had stuff to spill, and Sam was going to make a good recipient for it.

"Sam, my man," Epps slid a friendly arm around Sam's shoulders, holding him against his side and directing him to go where told, "there are some things we need to discuss. Man-to-man. You dig?"

"Uh... no," Sam looked back over his shoulder at Bumblebee under a pile of femmes, his Converse shoes trying to slow down Epp's steady pace without success, "but I guess I'll just go along with it."

Lennox grumbled lightly, and turned to leave, not looking happy.

Ironhide gazed at him, "Something the matter?"

"I'm going to get a bucket."

The black mech looked confused. "Why?" he demanded. Will was a Major now, he didn't need to get 'buckets', if there was a mess, he got a soldier to fix it, not him. If something was upsetting his human he wanted to know about it so he could shoot it.

Will growled, "To shovel up all the shit Epps is going to tell Sam about you guys."

It took Ironhide a few moments to process that. Then he got it. Optimus. Femmes. Himself. Chromia. Little baby bots. "Oh slag, Optimus, you have to stop Epps!"

"No, Ironhide," the Prime said calmly.

"But-! Chromia!"

The blue and red flamed mech put his foot down. "NO. We do not hold secrets from Sam, Epps may tell him whatever he wishes to say. Within reason."

"Even if the secrets are about you – and by extension – me?!" Ironhide insisted, getting worried. His cannons were spinning at an extremely fast rate due to his agitation.

Mikaela – being a wise girl – had taken in everything that was happening around her. If all of the mechs had never shown the slightest interest in the Arcee femmes before, and now they were all over Bumblebee like a rash, and Optimus had said 'the humans KNOW about the femmes and myself', then something major was going down. She put two-and-two together and sidled up to Ratchet and rapped a fist on his lower leg armor.

"Ratch?"

The CMO peered down at his favourite apprentice, "Yes Mikaela?"

"Is this about Optimus and his over-active interface drive?"

Ratchet smirked while Optimus Prime jerked and looked like he'd swallowed bad energon. Prime twitched – Mikaela knew about that?! He slowly turned his head to look down at the innocent seeming human woman. How much did Mikaela already know? Perhaps he'd better take her some place quiet and have a word with her...

"Isn't it always?" Ratchet said indulgently, holding his hands behind his back and rocking back and forth on his feet.

"B-but..." Mikaela's eyelids fluttered as she stumbled over her words, "Epps might break Sam! He can't take that kinda stuff!"

"No, he won't," Ratchet said smoothly, full of confidence, "he didn't when you took his virginity, I don't think learning about Optimus Prime's exploits and his NON-virginity with femmes will do it either."

All of the human soldiers within hearing distance of Ratchet's deep and highly audible voice - which was about half the base – grinned, smiled or laughed at the mention of Sam's cherry-popping and Prime's non-existent cherry.

"Way to go, Hatchet. TMI, Autobot, TMI," Mikaela growled darkly.

"Ratchet's bad?" Optimus Prime said hopefully.


	13. Chapter 13

**Male Is As Males Does**

Authors Note: I'm so sorry this has taken me so long to write! I lost some of my inspiration and spent a long time staring at a blank computer screen! _**Fantasyaddict101**_ gave me some help with ideas for this – all thanks to her! - so I've kicked myself into gear again. I think! On another note, I FINALLY have an Autobot tattoo which I got done a few days ago! Hooray! It's not that big, just a small original one (red and blue) on my left upper back, done by Kian at Innervision Tattoo in Sydney. Damn good job too! Professional and very talented. If you want one and you're in Australia, I highly recommend him.

**Chapter 13**

_**NEST, Diego Garcia, inside Epps' private room...**_

Sam Witwicky stared at Sargent Epps like he'd just turned into Big Bird and was talking about the letter 'A'.

"You're joking. You are. You _have_ to be," the boy insisted.

"Nope." Epps leant back in his chair and grinned, putting his hands behind his head. "No joke. Optimus is some sort of mechanical gigolo. I've never been in a locker room with'im, but man, what he has behind those groin plates must be pretty impressive."

Sam paled. He gulped audibly. "Uh... I, um... yeah. Okay. No, wait, _not_ okay." Images of a naked Optimus Prime with an elephant trunk swinging between his thighs were assaulting his poor brain. More images of the Autobot actually _using_ his gigantic appendage on one of the Arcee motorbikes caused Sam to grip the edges of his seat uncomfortably and wince. Where did he PUT it – in their tailpipes?! "You're telling me all this because... why, exactly?" he asked, dazed.

"You're his best human friend, my man," Epps sat up and patted Sam's shoulder, "buddies, soulmates, you've saved each others lives. He shouldn't be keeping secrets from you."

"...and we also don't want you to run away screaming if you accidentally come across Optimus doing something with Arcee that will explode your brain," Will Lennox said calmly, inserting himself into the conversation.

Lennox was leaning his shoulder on Epp's doorframe with his thumbs hooked into his belt loops, the Major having snuck in silently while the boy and man chatted. "It is not our desire to watch you run screaming across the tarmac yelling about robot sex. Unlike how we found out, we're giving you the news gently." Lennox straightened up, shifting his combat pants higher up onto his hips. "Besides, we're giving you guys a barbecue on the beach tonight – yes, Autobots included - and it is a possibility that Prime may sneak away in the dark to be with Arcee. We didn't want you innocently following after him and coming across... ah... you know."

"Like a frat boy, you dig?" Epps grinned wildly, enjoying himself. It was so nice to discuss this with another human besides Will.

"Oh God..." Sam whimpered, putting his head into his hands. He was beginning to realise that the 'bots had lives of their own other than saving the world, playing with humans, and being very cool aliens, and that Wheelie madly humping Mikaela's leg when they met Jetfire had NOT been a crude attempt by the tiny bot to copy humans – the Transformers really DID have sex. And how.

To Sam's dismay, Optimus Prime was patiently waiting for him when he finally was released from Epps' room. Sam paused on the tarmac at the sight of him, gulping down a wave of sudden panic. He didn't want to talk to him right now. He didn't. Not until the pornographic images in his head of mating robots stopped tormenting him. It didn't help that whenever he talked to Optimus, it didn't matter whether the huge Autobot was kneeling or standing, his crotch plates were always where his eyes were naturally drawn, since it was hard to make eye contact with the mech for too long, he was just too intimidating – friendly, and gentle; but intimidating. Sam's eyes always dropped downwards eventually, and that meant going straight downwards and onto Prime's crotch. That hadn't bothered Sam until now.

"Um... hi, Optimus. How've you been?" Sam asked, shoving his hands into his back jeans pockets. Trying to be casual around his giant friend despite the details on Transformer sex and Prime's love life that Lennox and Epps had just burdened his brain with. He kept his eyes carefully on his own feet or on Primes' faceplates.

Kind blue optics glowed down at him. "I have been well, Sam. And you?"

"Yeah, good. Good." The boy frowned down at his sneaker-clad feet. "So. You've um, you've got a girlfriend too, huh?"

The alien robot lifted his head skywards while he looked up the term 'girlfriend' and its connotations of the World Wide Web. Then he lowered himself down on one knee in front of the human boy, offering his best innocent expression. "Do you remember telling Mikaela not to look inside your treasure chest when we first visited your house? Because that was where you kept your most private possessions?"

Sam snorted, glancing up at Prime's large face hovering over his head, "Oh yeah. We all know about that one."

"Indeed," Optimus smiled, cocking his head, "Arcee is like that for me. The relationship I have with her is private. It was never my intent to keep secrets from you but I now feel my judgement was in error that I did not give you information about my position with regards to the female Autobots."

"No, no," Sam rubbed the back of his neck, not really wanting to participate in this conversation at all, "I know what you mean. It's just that..." he sighed, shaking his head, "don't get upset or anything, but you're like, my biggest hero, and thinking of you doing stuff like that, you know, with Arcee, is kind of, ah, unsettling. It's like thinking of my parents getting their hands all over each other. Scary."

Optimus drew his head back, confused, "Why would you worry about them doing that? They are your progenitors."

Sam frowned, "Think of yourself coming across Bumblebee doing what you do with Arcee."

A thunderstruck and out-of-place expression of OMG, and WTF appeared on Prime's faceplates. He had never thought of his sweet, innocent, and adorable youngling doing such a thing. "Yes. I do understand your position now..." he said gravely, his optics flaring.

"Oh good..." Sam said with relief. "But don't worry, you're still the same old Optimus Prime to me. I just know more about the things you do, is all. Understand?"

Prime nodded his head, smiling, "Understood."

_**Later that night, at the beach...**_

Cradling his plate on his lap, Sam chewed on his steak thoughtfully. He was staring at Optimus Prime and sitting on a large dead log provided by Ironhide as 'seats for the squishies' (Ironhide's words, for which Ratchet had grabbed his arm, upended his cannon, and swiftly poured a gallon of sand in it before Ironhide realised what was about to happen. The horrified black mech had spent the next half an hour madly emptying it and firing it out to sea to burn out the sand). The Autobot Leader was standing knee deep in the waves as an unofficial lifeguard, watching over the soldiers frolicking in the water and providing lighting in the dark using his chestlights. He'd had an encounter with a shark before, and was not willing to see any NEST personnel chomped and swallowed. Or missing legs.

"You want that tomato?"

"What?" Sam looked down to see a fork hovering over his salad. Mikeala – the owner of the fork - was looking at him expectantly. "Oh, nope, you take it."

"Great." The girl speared it and delivered it to her mouth. She swallowed. "Stop thinking about it, you'll hurt yourself."

"About what?" Sam looked at her accusingly.

Mikaela rolled her eyes, "Optimus and Arcee, dummy. They are allowed to have love lives. You don't hear them going all, 'Eeuew, my God, the humans touch one another!', now do you? So don't do it to them."

"_Sex_ lives, 'Kaela, _sex_ lives..." Sam grumbled. Then he froze. The Autobots could hear things said a mile away, and Prime's broad back was only a short jog down the beach. "Crap. Whoops."

"Yes, he can hear you..." his girlfriend chortled, putting more salad into her mouth. She almost choked on it when Optimus pivoted on one leg and gave them a knowing smile, lifting an optic ridge up comically.

Sam covered his eyes with one hand, groaning. The moment was broken by a scream from Ratchet. Ironhide had snuck up behind him, grabbed him by the hips, lifted him over his head, then swung around and threw him into the sea. A rousing cheer from the NEST soldiers drowned out the spluttering by the caught short CMO on his hands and knees in the water.

"Someone call Greenpeace! We've got a beached Autobot!" Lennox yelled, laughing.

Optimus silently pointed one finger in Ironhide's direction, glaring. His Weapons Specialist shrugged offhandedly, pointing his own finger at his abused cannon in explanation. Payback was a bitch.

Getting to his feet, Ratchet came stomping out of the waves with his huge arm-mounted saws spinning, causing Ironhide to take off over the sandhills at a fast jog. "Keep running, aft-head! Those cannons are _scrap _when I get my hands on you!"

While Optimus put his hands on his hips and watched the antics, a dark shape swam stealthily underwater up to the huge mech's legs. Prime only had a moments warning before he was rammed and toppled face first into the sea like a giant skyscraper. While the whole beach party gasped and turned to watch, Bumblebee emerged from underwater and stood up triumphantly, laughing at his victory over his Commander. His laughter turned into static shrieks when Optimus grabbed him by one yellow leg, upended him, and dragged him out up onto the beach by his foot. Bee dug his fingers into the sand and protested the whole way.

"BEE~!" Mikaela gasped, hands to her mouth. "Oh my God, he is so DEAD."

A dripping wet Optimus let go of Bumblebee's foot and stood over the contrite yellow mech with his hands on his hips. "Bumblebee..." he growled, "that was not nice."

"RETURN FIRE, MEN~!" Captain Graham abruptly yelled, and a volley of balloon waterbombs rained down upon the startled Autobot Leader from different vantage points on the beach. Optimus raised his forearms as shields, and took a step back, a startled expression of 'What the?!' on his faceplates. Bumblebee scrambled to safety, giving the others a thumbs up as he went.

"Ambush," General Morshower chuckled, sitting down next to Sam in his off-duty swimming shorts and scraping leftover bits of potato salad off his plate, winking slyly at Sam and Mikaela. "About time someone got the big guy. He needs some fun. Doesn't take enough time out for himself."

The Arcee femmes roared down onto the beach to surround Optimus, transform, and begin using their rifles on low power to take out the waterbombs before they hit their Commander. The human soldiers cursed, laughing and shaking their fists, knowing when they were beaten. Saved from the rain of balloon missiles by his ever-attentive femme groupies, Prime looked smug, crossing his arms over his big chest and grinning appreciatively. When the rain of waterbombs ceased, all three femmes lined up in front of Optimus and saluted him haughtily. The Autobot Commander dismissed them with a salute of his own.

"Well, damn..." Morshower drawled in awe, pausing in eating his dinner, "he's got an answer for everything, doesn't he."

"Women like Optimus, sir," Sam chuckled, "he has a whole har-"

"ARMY!" Mikaela interjected over the top of him, alarmed at Sam's near trip up, "he has a whole army at his disposal." She kicked Sam in the ankle warningly.

"Why, yes, yes he does," the General nodded, "though he treats them more like his family than soldiers. He's got a soft spot for every one of his crew. Amazing."

"Optimus' soldiers ARE his family," Mikaela said softly, staring at Optimus Prime's tall metal form, the light from the beach bonfire reflecting off his Cybertronian armor and making him appear golden. "Every bot lost is like a death blow to him. The really amazing thing is that he stays standing and keeps going."

Morshower was silent for a second. "Would I be out-of-line if I referred to him as a living legend?" he said quietly.

Sam perked up, "Absolutely not, Sir."

"Nope," Mikaela added, a supermodel's smile on her face. She already figured the words 'Prime' and 'legend' always belonged in the same sentence together. She was glad someone 'high-up' knew it too.

"Good." Morshower smiled, then heaved himself up, brushed off his swimming shorts, gave the two civilians a nod and left to mingle with the others.

Sam returned to leisurely finishing off his dinner, thinking about snagging a very large slice of cheesecake for dessert and wolfing it down before Ratchet could find him and lecture him at length about the evils of eating junkfood... speaking of which.... Sam glanced around.

Ironhide and Ratchet were missing.

Optimus was back to patrolling the beach – this time with a chattering Wheelie perched on his shoulder, Red Arcee at his side, and Major Lennox tagging along. Sideswipe was flat on his back after drinking the moderate amount of high-grade that Optimus would allow, with Mudflap and Skids in a similar state next to him. Jolt was attempting to sabotage a beach volleyball game. Then Sam realised something else.

The other two Arcee femmes were also missing.

"Oh no..." Sam whispered.

"Hmmm?" Mikaela said absently, swilling some lemonade around her mouth. Sam had to admire the skimpy black bikini she had on.

"Two femmes are missing, and so are two mechs. After what I just learnt today about Cybertronian sex, what do you think _that_ implies?" Sam asked, arching an eyebrow.

Mikaela straightened up. "Oh. But... they're not teenagers, Sam, they're adults. I'm sure they haven't gone off for-" the girl scrunched up her nose, "- Autobot nookie."

"You haven't talked to Ironhide that much, have you?" Sam retorted.

The answer to that came surprisingly quickly. The red Arcee bot let out a very loud groan and hunched over with both of her hands going between her legs. The rest of the soldiers on the beach failed to notice, but Optimus and Lennox did. While Lennox stood there with a surprised expression, the Autobot Leader stared at the stricken Arcee for a long moment – then he burst into action.

Hurriedly blurting out, "Nice night for a swim!", Optimus dumped Wheelie on his aft in the sand, boldly snatched up the moaning femme into his arms and took off into the water. He kept going, wading powerfully through the heavy water until he was up to his shoulders – which was a fair way out – and held the shuddering Arcee femme in his arms with his back facing the beach.

All was reasonably quiet for a few minutes more before a long high-pitched scream came from the femme held to Optimus Prime's chest. A scream that appeared to be echoed in the distance by two other feminine screams.

The whole beach ceased their activities and turned to stare at Optimus Prime. Eating stopped. Talking dried up. Volleyball ceased.

Slowly, the large mech turned around in the water and came back into the beach with his head lowered. Aware that everyone was staring at him, Optimus emerged from the water - refusing optic contact with anyone - and lowered a trembling Red Arcee to her feet, letting her prop herself on his hip, then opened his internal comlink.

::_Ratchet, Ironhide, get your miserable afts back to the beach and report to me, please.::_

"What the hell was that all about?!" Lennox demanded, holding his arms out wide. The other humans appeared confused – should they get out their weapons? What was going on? Why would the Transformers be screaming?

Optimus shook his head, motioning with one hand held up for silence. Grumpily, Lennox crossed his arms and waited impatiently.

No one had to wait for long. The twin forms of Ironhide and Ratchet appeared trudging over the nearest sandhill. As they got closer, sand could be seen sticking to their bodies in odd places. Ironhide even had bits of vegetation sticking out of his lower back. Ratchet's faceplates were set in an expression of complete innocence. Ironhide; on the other hand; was smirking openly. He was quite happy and relaxed. The soldiers on the beach parted wordlessly so the two could walk right up to the wet-but-still-imposing Optimus Prime.

There was silence as the pair of mechs halted in front of Optimus. Nothing was said. Optimus stared meaningfully at each mech in turn, then sighed. He walked a few strides to be behind his two at-attention soldiers, then raised his hands behind their heads and gave them both an almighty smack to the back of their heads with the palms of his hands.

Ratchet rolled his optics and kept looking skywards at the night stars. Ironhide growled and glared at his Commander.

No one could understand what the heck was going on. General Morshower began to consider stepping up and questioning the situation – just as two Arcee femmes came meekly over the same sandhill the two male Autobots had just appeared from. The Blue Arcee – Chromia – had the biggest Primus-be-praised grin on her face, while the Purple Arcee was in a dreamy daze, walking on trembling legs and just barely staying upright.

...and both were covered with sand.

Sam was the first to speak. "Oh... my... God..." He put his head in his hands and groaned. He got it. He so completely, got it.

Most of the NEST soldiers were beginning to understand. They were the ones with their jaws hanging around their bellybuttons. The others began to understand when Bumblebee let rip with a long wolf whistle, and Purple Arcee giggled, covering her mouthplates with her hands. She stood sheepishly next to Ratchet. Chromia snorted, proudly standing next to Ironhide with her head held high and her hands propped on her hips.

The whole beach turned to stare accusingly at Ratchet and Ironhide. The CMO kept his composure, but Ironhide cracked.

"What?!" Ironhide demanded, opening his arms out wide. "We need to reproduce, the freaking Allspark got slagged, remember?!"


	14. Chapter 14

**Male Is As Male Does**

Authors Note: Massive update here, guys! I've been bit hard by the vile affliction, writers block. Apologies for the long hiatus! And thanks to everyone who has visited my FFN profile and voted for a mech in my poll for my other fic, '_Waiting_'. I'm surprised at who is coming second! Votes are still coming in, so things may change, but, wow, I guess medics with a lot of talent and big wrenches are very appealing... or do you all just like the way he wiggles his cute aft when he's happy? LOL Yes, go Ratchet, you show'em, babe! And hey, does no one love poor Wheeljack? Inventors need love too, you know.

**Chapter 14**

_**The morning after the beach party escapade, NEST base, Diego Garcia...**_

Wheelie propelled himself across the tarmac, running an errand for Major Lennox. After the bigger Autobots had 'outed' themselves to the whole base with their 'love making', he was careful to not cross the path of Ratchet or Ironhide. So far, he'd spent the morning hanging with his Warrior Goddess and the other humans. He did find them easier to get along with, in any case.

The whole base was talking - the humans were, at any rate - about the indiscretion committed by Ratchet and Ironhide at the beach barbecue, where they snuck off and indulged in intimate activities in the sandhills with two of Optimus Prime's femmes. The femmes themselves (Chromia, and the purple Arcee femme) were considered blameless, since they were, you know, femmes, and could only be co-erced into doing naughty things by reckless mechs, and when it came to females, Ironhide and Ratchet were a peerless duo. Yes, Optimus was THE alpha male, but he rarely paired up with another mech to be with his femmes. In that respect, Ratchet and Ironhide were on top.

Wheelies audio receptors were as keen and adapt as those of the other Cybertronians and he'd been easily picking up and laughing at the comments he'd been hearing. He thought it was such a hoot to see the noble Autobots in a scandal. Not that he would ever express such a sentiment to Ratchet or Ironhide personally. He valued his body and face just they way they were.

...but when the tiny Autobot inadvertently rolled past the inventory hangar and caught sight of Ironhide sitting on his aft in the door way with his wrists hanging over his drawn up knees, Wheelie couldn't restrain himself. His chestplates lifted. Dang it, he had to have some fun in life.

With a fearlessness he didn't think he possessed, he swerved a wee bit closer to the big black mech and chuckled, waggling his optic ridges at the brooding mech while making thrusting movements with his hips.

Ironhide's optics narrowed. With a loud snarl he readied a small bolt he'd been aimlessly playing with between his fingertips, and threw it. Hard. With accuracy on the extreme side of perfect, naturally.

Wheelie shrieked as the bolt smacked him in the side of his head, "OWWW! Ow! Slag it! Ow!", he spun around on his wheels, clutching his head, "Ya crazy bitch, whadja do that for, dumb-aft?! " The bolt hadn't really hit that hard, but he was used to playing things up to get a mixture of attention and sympathy. He thrived on it.

Optimus Prime heard the carry on and came out of the Autobot hangar on the opposite side of the tarmac, curious, first poking his head out the door experimentally then coming fully outside. He didn't have to use much of his daunting and legendary processing power to work out that Ironhide had done something to Wheelie. The huge male stood up in a proud stance with his hands on his hips and sent Ironhide an admonishing glare.

"What?" Ironhide asked, shrugging his shoulders and innocently holding his hands out palm upwards to his Leader, "he was snickering at me!"

With bold strides, the Autobot Commander approached the two bots. "Everyone snickers at you Ironhide, it's standard operating procedure." He halted and looked kindly down at Wheelie, "Are you injured, Wheelie?"

The tiny bot grumbled loudly and poked his fingers experimentally into the side of his head, feeling the struts and parts. "Guess I'm okay. Maybe Ratch' had better take a look-" he caught himself quickly; if Ironhide was throwing things, the CMO would throw _bigger_ things, "- no, nope. Not goin' near the Hatchet!"

Prime assessed Wheelie with a quick sub-dermal scan and found nothing more than a disgruntled ego. "Very well then. Ironhide, cease picking on bots smaller than you." He nodded politely at the two bots and continued on his way. The sound of his big feet hitting the tarmac echoed around the buildings.

Ironhide smirked at Wheelie with a "I won, I didn't get smacked" expression and loudly spun the gyros in his cannons. Wheelie hissed and stuck up two fingers, using both of his hands in a double-barrel salute.

The Weapons Specialist snarled, leaning forwards and hovering dangerously over the now-cringing bot, "If I shove you head first down one cannon and fire it, you might just end up in Antarctica, runt. How's landing aft first and getting an icicle shaft up your exhaust sound? More exciting than what a femme could ever do to you, yes?"

That was it for Wheelie. His bravery only stretched so far. He took off as fast as his mini wheels could spin, wailing, "OPTIMUS!"

Prime's huge red and blue frame halted. His back armor flexed. He glanced over his shoulder just as Wheelie crashed at full flight into the back of his splayed foot and bounced off in a messy tumble. Wheelie threw himself back onto the Autobot Commanders foot. "Help! SAVE ME! He wants to blow me up and then shove _things_ up my aft!"

The whirring of powerful gears and compressing hydraulics filled the air like music as the giant mech crouched down on one knee. He offered his palm to the distressed mini mech. Stifling a resigned sigh, he beckoned the little mech with his fingers, "Hop on. You can follow me around today."

Wheelie hesitated for only a microsecond – would following him mean being with him when he went to the femmes?! - then decided that was the lesser of two evils when it came to Ironhide. He rolled himself onto the outstretched hand and plopped himself down onto his chrome tailpipes. "Thanks dude!" Snuggled into Prime's protective hand, Wheelie stared back at Ironhide, "Rude bot!" he said loudly.

Optimus lifted one optic ridge, his noseplates twitching, "Yes, Ironhide can be hard to co-habitate with, but he would also be the first bot to help you or protect you with his life if you were in trouble, Wheelie. Do not take everything he says or does so seriously. He enjoys shocking others by not following social protocols."

"Uh huh," Wheelie leant his head back, looking up at the face of his new Leader, "so when he said he has a bigger interface than you, he was only joking around?"

Prime came to an abrupt halt that sent shudders through his chassis, his optics spread wide open in disbelief, "He WHAT?!"

_**Over in the humans residential hangar...**_

Bumblebee was splayed out on his back upon the floor with his two favourite humans perched on top of him. Mikaela sat cross-legged on his chest, while Sam sat sideways to her and dangled his legs down Bee's side, drummingg his heels lightly on the Camaro's yellow armor. He'd rolled up the legs of his jeans to try and cool down. Not a great look for him but he was too hot to care. Diego Garcia was HOT. Mikaela still looked like her perfectly coiffed self, he honestly didn't know how she managed it. The humidity wasn't even making her hair go frizzy, for chrissakes.

"It's just like, I dunno," Sam shrugged, rubbing one hand up and down his sweaty neck, "thinking of family doing this stuff. Optimus doing it un-nerves me, it's much easier to think of _him_ doing this than anyone else because he is such a nice looking mech, but Ironhide and Ratchet?" The boy blinked rapidly, "Uh, no. Keep that away from me!"

Mikaela smacked him on the shoulder and then played with his hair, "It's smack _them_, silly. But, uh, you might ask someone bigger than them to do the smacking. Optimus usually does what you want. You two are tight."

"Mmm..." Sam mumbled non-committally, smoothing his hair back down.

Bee nodded carefully in agreement at his charges, being careful not to dislodge them with his movements. He had learned that screams of 'AHHH!' followed by a splat sound on concrete usually meant that was the end of a human, and he liked his humans, they were the best. No splatting. Prime had always advised him to keep his friends happy by providing them with not just protection with guns and missiles, but also food, shelter and companionship. Like pets, but, not. Never pets. Family.

Three slender female forms snuck in the hangar door – and three chirps and squeals of delight echoed around the hangar.

"Bee!"

"Bumblebee!"

"My BB!"

"Oh God," Sam groaned dramatically and scrambled to get off his robot best friend, "It's them again!"

Mikaela snickered at him. "Big baby, they only want to hug him. You so just do _not_ get girl stuff, do you?"

Bumblebee trilled happily when the three female Autobots descended upon his prone body. Arms threaded themselves around his torso, kisses were pressed to the side of his head, and his armor was stroked and polished. The femmes chattered rapidly in Cybertronian back and forth to each other while they lavished love upon their play mech. This kind of mass hugging and petting experience had been going on for days. Sam had thought it was cute at first, seeing his best friend smothered in femmes, but now he was just irritated. Couldn't the femmes find another mech to throw themselves on with gay abandon? After all, wasn't that what they had Optimus for? Really! He had yet to see Prime flattened by squealing females every time he rounded a corner.

"How on Earth does Optimus let you get away with being smothered by the femmes, Bee? Doesn't he have to give permission or something?" Sam asked with annoyance, standing and watching the 'disgusting' sight of his best mech friend covered with females from TWO species – Cybertron AND Earth. Wherever he and his friend went around the base, they were sure to run into a femme somewhere who would shriek with delight and demand to hug him. The human soldiers had noticed what was happening as well. Sam had seen the look on Major Lennox's face. Resignation. Mildly amused acceptance. Just one more thing for the Major to process and deal with while keeping his brain locked down from thinking about robot sex.

Bumblebee's blue optics flickered and he looked over at his boy, a femme snuggled in each arm while the other one petted his helmet armor. He carefully activated his vocaliser. "I am not a threat to Prime's maleness or authority, Sam. I am a youngling still learning about these things, and I would never take advantage of his property."

"...and they're just hugging him, not fucking him," Mikaela said wisely, chewing on one fingernail with total non-concern. She was leaning back against Chromia's arm where the femme had flung it over Bee's midsection.

Bee tapped her gently on the head with one silver fingertip, "Language, please."

Sam laughed at Mikaela looking grumpy and pouting. He stopped when he heard a familiar grunt followed by a deep growl. Heavy footsteps that rattled the ceiling of the building made him cringe. Oh, he knew who _that_ was, and he didn't sound happy either.

Ironhide's big black frame thumped its way through the open double doors and up to where Bumblebee lay covered in femmes. With a near snarl of possessiveness, the Weapons Specialist halted next to where the Camaro was lying. He gave Bee a disgusted glare. "You have something of mine and I want it back."

Chromia yelped when the black mech put his hands around her slender waist and lifted her up and over his right shoulder with a grunt. Mikaela bent over and put her arms over her head protectively, wary of thick alien metal accidentally colliding with her flesh and causing damage.

Ironhide bent down to get his faceplate right up into that of a bewildered Bumblebee, "Getcha own femme, runt, I ain't sharing."

Mikaela – wanting to help and seeing her moment – lifted her right arm and gave Ironhide a hearty smack to his cheekplate, hissing. "Don't you come grabbing an Arcee femme like she's property! Have some respect! You can't treat girls like this! I thought you were better than that!"

The black mech turned a brooding smile upon the indignant human girl and smirked, "Do that again and I'll have you up on my other shoulder, sweetspark. I like the feisty ones."

Sam's eyes widened. Bumblebee made a high pitched distressed trill and made a playful swipe at the leg of the older mech. He missed.

"HEY!" Chromia smacked Ironhide's backplates hard, the thick thudding sound she made sounded exactly the same pitch as when she smacked him in the head. She reckoned that said a lot for his intelligence, lovable though he was. "You have no right to be grabbing me as-you-please, lughead!"

"You're sharing my berth, femme, that makes you mine. You should've thought of that before you went throwing yourself at another mech."

Chromia wore a shocked expression. She wasn't used to being mech-handled like this! "As if! And I did not throw myself at Bumblebee, we were just having a friendly hug!"

"Suck it up, female."

Ironhide headed for the door with his stolen booty held securely over his bulky shoulder strut.

The other two femmes transformed their arms into their signature cannons with the loud hum of charging weaponry, aiming them at Ironhide's aft. "You want rescuing, Blue, just ask. We'll re-arrange his skidplates for you."

Chromia - mortified that she was actually enjoying her time on Ironhide's mechly shoulder – groaned loudly, putting one hand over her face and using the other to wave them off. "I'll be alright, I'll catch up with you later... tell Optimus I'm okay."

Multiple clicks of weapons being disengaged and transformed filled the hangar. "As you wish, sister."

Sam had been standing back from all this, watching with alternating expressions of humor and nervousness. It was a terrible cliche to use on Ironhide, especially considering his giant cannons, but the black mech really was a loose cannon. He took in the wistful expression on the faceplate of the purple Arcee. He wasn't the only one who noticed her dreamy look.

Pink Arcee gave her remaining sister a poke. "I know what you're thinking of..."

"Well, you know," purple Arcee shrugged, becoming sheepish, her optics wistful, "Ratchet has a nice shoulder too. I wonder if I could persuade him to do that to me?"

As Chromia was carried away, she told the small part of herself that was feeling guilty to take a hike. She had been trying to think of a way to tell Ironhide that she had spent a night on Optimus Prime's berth when he was on an overnight trip to Moscow. She knew he wouldn't take it nicely, but so what? Prime had MORE rights to her companionship than 'Hide did. Besides, she had been wanting to compare the interfacing techniques of the two, and needed a 'refresher' from Optimus to make her satisfied which mech she truly thought was better on the berth. If Ironhide was reacting this way to her hugging Bumblebee, she now knew that mentioning 'I', 'berth', 'interface', and 'Optimus' in the same sentence might be highly volatile to her health.

What Ironhide didn't know couldn't hurt him.

She kept her mouthplates shut.

_**One week later...**_

The weekly briefing meeting in the Operations hangar was dragging on like Megatron trying to tow the Titanic from the ocean floor for shits and giggles - heavy and stuck. So it was a welcome – if rude – relief when Ratchet came stomping angrily in the hangar doors and glared at Optimus and Ironhide. Prime was standing in his usual position in the semi-quadrangle of raised platforms that the human members of NEST were using. His Weapons Specialist was in his vehicle mode.

Not for long...

General Morshower trailed off mid-speech with his mouth hanging open when the cranky alien medic stalked up to the Topkick and gave Ironhide a good kick in the fender, leaving a shallow dent and the humans cringing and making round-mouthed 'oww' expressions.

With a roar, Ironhide transformed in a mesh of limbs and armor, pulling one thick arm back to land a punch. "SLAGHEAD! What was that for?!"

Major Lennox jerked in surprise and dropped his bundle of papers. "What the..." he blinked rapidly, "Ratchet! I can have you up on charges for that! You can't assault another solider!"

Epps – who had been standing at Optimus Prime's ankles – began backing away from the giant mechs legs, seeking safety under the overhanging platforms. "I don't think he cares, Will! Oh shit, oh _man_... Ironhide, what did you do, brother?"

Ratchet put one strong hand on Hide's chest and shoved him away. Then he pointed one finger each at him and the Autobot Leader. "You-" he pointed at Optimus, who lifted one optic ridge and looked annoyed, "-and _you_," Ratchet then stabbed a finger at a harshly glaring Ironhide, "my medbay. NOW. And don't either of you try to mess me around. We have a situation here that is top level and very dangerous. So get your afts moving! Or so help me Primus, I'll tranq BOTH of you and drag you there aft first and crying!"

Confused, Optimus Prime gave the General a weak shrug of his wide massive shoulders, lining up his bright blue bewildered optics with the eyes of the human Commander, "Apologies, General, may we continue this after I have attended to this... _vital_ emergency?"

Morshower nodded slowly. He didn't know what to think of this, but heck, he needed a little mens room stop anyway, "Uh... proceed?"

"Thank you."

Prime and Ironhide followed Ratchet out of the hangar. The Weapons Specialist began snarking and threatening his friend the moment they were out of human hearing, but he kept heading to the medbay. He didn't want his mech parts taken offline. No way. Prime was a lot more meek. He refrained from engaging his CMO in conversation, instead walking steadily behind the pissed off mech. Whatever had riled up Ratchet and disappeared up his exhaust pipe to make him snap was obviously serious, and he would find out what was happening soon enough. It couldn't be a life-or-death emergency, Ratch' would've been sending him emergency codes and comlink protocols... so what was it?

As soon as all three mechs entered the medbay building, Ratchet slid the huge doors shut with a loud slam. Ironhide turned to snarl at Ratchet, his arms lifting up and his cannons beginning to roll.

Optimus immediately began asking questions, "Ratchet, what is going on? What is so important that-"

The CMO interrupted him with a growl, and pointed sharply at the furthest medbay bench. Chromia was sitting on the edge of it. Her hands propped either side of her knees and her legs swinging gently back and forth alternately. She slowly lifted her head, her expression both bewildered and amused. Her optics were abnormally bright under the glow of the medbay overhead lights. She gave them a weak smile, then ducked her head, staring at the floor.

That was a big sign. Optimus already knew that for Chromia, this kind of behaviour was unusual. The blue Arcee sister was a hard aft, not prone to appearing meek or upset. Next to nothing distressed her. She took everything thrown her way, and threw it back – with extras. There was something wrong here. Gone was the bold outspoken femme he knew.

"Mia?" Ironhide strode towards her, concern for her making his spark throb. "You okay?" He held his hand out to her, palm upwards. The blue femme carefully laid her small hand in his, closing her digits around his huge hand as much as she could. She sighed, mutely shaking her head.

"No, she is not," Ratchet snapped. "Chromia, do want to explain this or shall I?"

Optimus kept walking until he was one arms length away from the femme. Now he was getting upset. Despite Ironhide laying claim to her, Chromia was his responsibility. His to protect and look after, in all respects. Ironhide had just been... borrowing her. Whatever was going on, he wondered why she hadn't come to him first.

Chromia visibly pulled herself together and met Ratchet's enquiring gaze head on. Her chin lifted proudly. "You tell them, after all, we don't know which of them is responsible for it."

"It?" Prime echoed, turning to face the medic, his heavy armor creaking as his body shifted.

"Yes, 'it'." Ratchet clenched his hands into fists and planted them on his hips. His yellow-green armor glinted harshly. "Chromia is carrying. She has a sparkling orb in her chest, and she has no idea which of you aftheads is the sire, since she has been with both of you in the past Earth week. Get the drift?"

**NEXT:** Who did it? Who done it? Who's your dad-dy? ::snicker:: Well, now we know that at least one of the mechs ain't shooting blanks. They were supposed to, but, whoops. Heh. Cybertronian birth control, so unreliable. Tsk!


	15. Chapter 15

**Male Is As Male Does**

**Authors Note: **Yes, here is the next bit. There were quite a few grammatical and editing errors in the previous chapter. Sorry about that! Thanks for all the reviews too. I haven't gotten around to responding to everyone yet, I have a day off in a few days so I'll try and get my responses out.

**_Special Note: _**I must give a HUGE, gigantic, heartfelt, thanks to my accomplice, _**cmo-hatchet**_, for some help with this chapter (and to Plenoptic, she's a great cohort too!). I did read a possible ending to this chappie on her LiveJournal page, and when I was rapidly typing this chapter out at midnight - sweaty and sleep-deprived - Ironhide swerved the plot-line into an almost exact copy of **_cmo_**'s wish for what WOULD happen. I was going to have Optimus and Ironhide having a little fight and Ratchet dragging them both out of the medbay by their audios, but it didn't turn out that way. So, all thanks and praise to **_cmo-hatchet _**for this. (Okay, am I off the hitlist now? Can I have my Magnus and stick back now? Yes? Please?)

**Chapter 15**

_**Ratchet's medbay, Diego Garcia...**_

"Chromia is carrying. She has a sparkling orb in her chest, and she has no idea which of you aftheads is the sire, since she has been with both of you in the past Earth week. Get the drift?"

As Ratchet's words filled the tense silence of the medbay, Chromia bowed her head and placed a hand softly on the middle portion of her torso, letting it settle against the curves of her armor. Hey, there was no sound of a mech toppling over backwards. No one was hitting the floor as their CPU went down. Was that a plus or a negative?

She didn't want to look at any of the mechs. Not Optimus. Not Ironhide. To look at any of them was to see the emotions on their faces and she could feel them easily enough with her own spark. Merge your spark with a mechs spark without 'bonding' and forevermore if you stood close enough to them, and the mech in question was having strong emotions, you could feel it. Optimus wasn't angry, he'd never be angry about something like this; or anything else. Ironhide... she knew what his spark was like, and it wasn't all big, brash and violent. The rough act he put on, all of his peculiar foibles, some of it was fakery, some of it the real deal. Inside he was a quiet mech. Not shy, just contemplative. He was wise too. Ratchet would laugh if she told him that, but he was.

The spark of the big black mech was solid. More solid and strong than that of Prime. It had surprised her. They'd all been taught or told that no mech had a more solid and indefatigable spark than that of their Leader. Well, she'd found one. Ironhide's.

"A.... sparkling?"

Keeping her optics on the ground, Chromia smiled slightly. Her body twitched. That was Optimus. The legendary big bot. His voice had gone up several octaves. It sounded like someone had flattened that wonderful big sexy chest of his down into one the size of Wheelie's. Or Megatron had strolled up and grabbed his interface in one large hand – and yanked it.

"Yes, Prime. One of those bouncing, shrieking, chirping things that make you smile and cry at the same time." Ratchet. He sounded closer than before. Was he worried about Optimus and Hide having a go at one another and hitting her by mistake? Did mechs fight when there was a femme between them that could be carrying their sparkling? She didn't really know.

"But... but..." Optimus attempted to articulate. Or in-articulate, as the case may be. Without success.

Chromia wanted to look up and interrupt. She really did. But no. Let the mechs have their rounds of slapping each other, slapping themselves, Ratchet slapping them – it was better to let the insanity reign before she stuck her noseplates into it.

"But, but, but," Ratchet happily parroted him, cocking his head from side-to-side with each 'but', "And your point is? You're a big mech, she's a fertile femme, when things happen, _other_ things happen. Welcome to one of those things. If you didn't WANT one of those things, you should have kept your interface and spark to yourself. I'm sure someone would have told you this when you were a youngling, surely."

The femme snickered at the snappy growl that came from the Autobot Commander. Ratchet was enjoying himself. Go medbot.

"I didn't do it."

Chromia looked up at hearing Ironhide speak, his deep tone a counterpoint to Ratchet's snark. She stared at him blankly. He was standing with his weight shifted back on one splayed black foot as if he was about to run, his hands held up in a 'no way' gesture. 'I didn't do it'? That was his whole contribution to this? She frowned. Where was the chest beating, the whoops of 'Yeah!', the kissing, the crying? Anything? Didn't the dumbaft want a young one?

Ratchet twitched his noseplates, a sure sign he was enjoying this. Fragger. "Like I said before-"

"No, no, I mean, my programs were all off. They always are," Ironhide insisted, looking nervous, flexing his shoulders so the split portions of his Topkick hood on his chest moved up and down, "my protocols weren't engaged. There is nothing happening down there. Even if Chromia HAD been running hers-"

"AS IF!" Chromia snarled, dropping her head enough so her optics blazed brightly under the overhang shadow of her helmet armor. "Don't blame me for this!"

"- nothing was coming from me for her to engage with."

Silence.

Ratchet blinked his optic shutters. Slowly. Very slowly. He rolled his optics, lifting up one of his hands and turning it over to nonchalantly inspect his fingertips for micro dents and scratches. Total denial and disinterest.

"You don't believe me?!" Ironhide threw his hands up, "Fine! Inspect it yourself! Look!"

The distinct sound of a set of crotchplates opening and the very faint sound of a mech spike pressurising caused Optimus Prime to lurch into action in a blur of red and blue armor. He grabbed his Weapons Specialist by the shoulders and spun him away from facing Chromia and Ratchet. "Close your plates, soldier! There's a femme present!"

"Optimus, I have seen it, you know! He can't offend me!" Chromia protested, holding up a slender hand to gesture him to stop. "What do you think I was doing on his berth, polishing his cannons with my glossa?!"

"...I can quite confidently say I've seen it before too," Ratchet said dryly, folding his arms over his black Hummer bumper bar on his chest, "and it wasn't a memorable moment, I assure you. Prime, you're the only one here who hasn't had the pleasure of seeing it."

"Nor do I want to," Prime grumbled, scrunching up the plates of his nose sensors. He smacked Ironhide in the backplates with the back of his hand while looming over him, "Close it. Now."

Ironhide vented hard and grumbled as his spike retracted and his plates shut once more. Optimus leaned down over his shoulder to check he was respectable before he relaxed his grip on his body and stepped back. The black mech huffed at him, turning around, "For the mech with all the femmes at his disposal, you really are such a prude, you know that?" He jerked his head at Ratchet, "You should be checking his equipment. He's the mech that needs a sparkling, he's a Prime, the Ancient Prime's told him to reproduce."

The Autobot Leader stood up to his full height and gave Ironhide filthy look. His tall stance, narrowed optics, far-too-handsome faceplates, powerful limbs and flame-decorated heavy armor made Chromia's spark sizzle. He'd always make her spark flutter faster. She was falling in love with Ironhide, but no femme could be immune to the presence and seductivity of the Supreme Autobot Commander.

Optimus frowned at his Weapons Specialist, "Let me assure you, ALL of you, my reproduction programs have been deactivated for the last two-and-a-half thousand Earth years, and my protocols have been down for even longer."

"Yeah, but," Ironhide gave Prime's regal crotch an appraising stare, shifting his feet under his hips in a rugged stance, "are you leaking something from down there that you shouldn't be? Check him over, Ratch."

"It does not leak!" Optimus said in a strangled tone, "I do not leak! From _anywhere_!"

"Some older mechs have trouble with dribbles. I think he needs the full diagnostic," Ironhide kept going, his head nodding as he spoke, "you know, send a catheter wire down the middle of it through the slit, go back into his storage tank and take a sample. He could be letting through a few over-eager reproduction nanites without anyone knowing about it."

Growling, Optimus levered his thick thighs apart in a wider standing stance and pointed stiffly at his own groin with one long finger, "There is nothing wrong with me _down there_!"

"Um," Chromia hesitantly lifted her blue-armorclad arm up to get their attention back onto her, "If it helps, I've never noticed it leaking before and I've been down there a few times. It only releases something when he overloads and that's normal for a mech." She shrugged, "Does that help?"

Ironhide shook his head at her, waving a self-important finger, "No sweetspark, I think we need to get a sample from him-"

With a loud rumbling growl, Optimus reached out and hooked his hand over the top of Ironhide's chest armor, smoothly and steadily pulling the black mech close-up to his own body so they were faceplate-to-faceplate, his voice dangerously calm and determined, "If I need to have a _wire _inserted into my interface, _so will you_. If Ratchet needs a transfluid sample from me, _so will you_. Understand?"

Chromia made a painful facial expression. Prime – for all of his kind, gentle and caring nature - could be so slagging literal and bossy at times. If she'd been a mech, she would've been running for the hills. A 'wire' or some such thing down the middle of there; IN there; ouch. No fragging way. Never.

"Would you two cut the slag and worry about the poor femme actually carrying this sparkling?!" Ratchet snapped. "Here's Chromia on my bench, she's been roughed up by both of you this week for some strange reason – Primus knows if I was a femme I wouldn't let either of you within spitting distance of me - and here you both are arguing about _your_ feelings and who did it! I should get Major Lennox to shove you both into C-17 and dump you on a deserted island." The CMO stood behind Chromia and laid a gentle hand on her shoulder. "There are more important things to talk about other than what is or isn't wrong with your interfaces."

Optimus looked stricken. Ironhide was close behind him in the guilty stakes.

Ratchet continued, "We now have a new Autobot on the way, and you should both face up to this like the mature bots you are. Take responsibility for what has happened and apologise to this brave, bold femme please."

Optimus reacted first. The big Commander mech approached his femme warrior and stood in front of her with his illustrious helmeted head bowed, "Chromia, I apologise sincerely. Please forgive me, forgive _us_, for acting like junk bots."

"MOVE." Ironhide placed both of his hands on Optimus Prime's hefty shoulder and shoved him aside; no mean feat considering Prime's size and mass. Optimus moved over gracefully, giving Ironhide room.

Chromia blinked at the black mech standing in front of her, his thick wide chest pushed out towards her. He wasn't as tall as Optimus – what mech was? - but she still had to lift her head and tilt it back to look him in the optics, and those blue orbs; even the one scarred by weapons fire; were staring into hers with a beseeching expression.

"Chromia, I'm sorry to have been one of the mechs who put you into this position, you shouldn't have to sit there wondering which of us has sired this sparkling. I just..." Ironhide's words trailed off, his gaze dipping down momentarily, frowning, "I just want you to know that I'm here to support you and protect you."

The blue femme sat with her hands in her lap, staring at him. Trying to work him out. Was he saying he didn't want this sparkling? Her hand lifted to touch his black armor, "Ironhide.."

"...and I truly believe that this sparkling has been sired by Optimus, not me -"

"WHAT?!" Chromia stiffened. Shocked.

"Ironhide, no," Prime interjected, shaking his head, his hands spread out in denial, "it could have been either of us, don't -"

"- I think it's obvious that with all of the supernatural mystic whatevers carrying on around here lately, with the ancient Primes and the Matrix, that Prime has been able to produce this miracle with you as a result of their intervention and the need for another Prime descendant, and..." his faceplates moved into a neutral expression, "and I'll leave you two to it. I should never have come between you two in the first place. I had no right. The sparkling is his." A heavy sigh. "You are Prime's by law. Stay with him, let him look after you."

With that, before anyone could speak or stop him, Ironhide turned, ducked his head to avoid looking at anyone, and strode out of the medbay. The sliding doors closed with a thunk behind his broad back.

Ratchet dropped the probe he'd just picked up onto the floor with a clang from his numb fingers. Ironhide was leaving?! He wasn't going to fight Optimus for the right to say the sparkling was his?! He'd expected Ironhide to be wrestling Optimus onto the floor and shoving a cannon to his chest to proclaim Chromia's sparkling as his...

"PITSPAWN!" Chromia grabbed one of the tools on Ratchet's medtray – she didn't know what it was and didn't care – and flung it at the doors. "Fragger! Useless junkpile!" Another tool went flying. "Don't walk out on me..." Chromia's voice broke, dying to a static filled whimper, the next tool she'd picked up dropped to the floor lifelessly with a clatter, "...don't... d-don't..." Her right arm transformed into her cannon but she didn't fire it. The tip of it slowly sank down to rest on the bench next to her hip. Lifeless.

The femme didn't know who owned the chest that she was pulled into. Her CPU wasn't processing colors, designs and shapes. It was just a chest and shoulder offering her comfort for her to have a mostly-silent breakdown bawl into. She held one hand curled under her chin and let herself be rocked and soothed. Her CPU was a mess.

Optimus Prime had started to stride after Ironhide, but when Chromia broke down, he halted uncertainly and watched Ratchet hold Chromia to him and try to calm her as she sat on the bench in a slump. His spark felt like it was breaking. "Chromia... Mia, please, it's alright, I'm here for you. I won't walk, never!" He stood nervously, wanting so desperately to approach the devasted femme, "Chromia?"

Ratchet's optics bored into his and he gave a negative jerk of his head. Not now. "It's okay, it's okay, we'll look after you." Ratchet soothed his hand up and down her back, rubbing between her shoulder armor. Maybe he should offer her a sedative? It wasn't good for her or the sparkling to be upset like this.

::_Go and re-arrange his stupid aft, Optimus_.::

Prime met Ratchet's optics. ::_Do you think he's right? This sparkling is mine?:_:

::_No, I think you've both got an equal chance of being the sire. Ironhide's spark is a natural match for Chromia's, I've known that medically for a long time, but he is also right with his reasoning about you being the sire as well. It really could be either of you! Go and smack him around for a bit and I'll do what I can for Chromia_.::

Optimus Prime hesitated...

::_GO!_::

...then pushed aside the medbay doors and went to look for his Weapons Specialist.


	16. Chapter 16

**Male Is As Male Does**

_**Authors Note:** _Thank you for all the reviews! Each one is read and loved! More thanks to _**cmo-hatchet **_for her help in the previous chapter which has spilled over into this one. The humour that was mostly missing in the previous chapter is back full force for this one. Beware if you are, er, eating or drinking (so reviewers in the past have told me). Oh, and if anyone is confused by how I refer to the 'Arcee femmes', I'm working on the original assumption by Bay and the script-writers (before they changed it AFTER the movie was released!) that Arcee is one femme split into three bodies. Hence, 'Blue' Arcee (who has now assumed her own identity, 'Chromia'), 'Pink' Arcee and 'Purple' Arcee. Does that help?

**Chapter 16**

_**NEST, Diego Garcia...**_

Optimus Prime paused once he had exited the medbay and swept his optics across the tarmac in front of him, his tall frame tense and unusually rigid. No Ironhide. Where was he? Where would he go? The base was on an island, he couldn't start driving and keep going, he'd end up bogged on the beach or in the sea. And if he was stubborn enough to drive in one endless, cranky, non-stop circle around the island, Major Lennox would avail himself of a Cybertronian rifle and shoot out his wheels. Then Epps would wheel-clamp him momentarily for a laugh and lean on his hood triumphantly while the other soldiers took trophy photos and Ironhide turned the air blue with revenge threats.

"Here."

Prime looked to his right, surprised at the right-on-target verbal comment that answered his mental question.

"What?" Ironhide narrowed his optics at his Leader and friend, "I may have walked out of the room but I'm not going to keep on running. I'm not that bad." Ironhide had walked along the exterior wall to the medbay and slid his hard aft down the wall and onto the sandy ground, leaning back on the building with his knees drawn up in front of him and his hands in his lap. "Take a seat if you want one."

Optimus sent a quick message to his CMO to tell him that he'd found Ironhide. With a chorus of groaning gears, the big mech got down onto the ground and settled himself against the wall, one of his legs stretched out in front of him while he pulled up the other one to rest one hand on his knee. For all of his inbuilt wisdom, intelligence and charisma, Prime was a bit stuck for words. It wasn't every orn that a femme was potentially carrying his sparkling. A Prime line sparkling He was all at once ecstatic, bewildered, shocked, felt like he'd been run over by Ultra Magnus – twice, with some reversing thrown in for fun – and yet, he had a warm ball of happiness sitting right smack in the middle of his chest, and it was getting bigger and brighter by the minute. So, what did Ironhide feel?

"How are you doing?"

Ironhide frowned, keeping his optics looking out into the distance, "Why are you asking me that?" he intoned, "Ask Chromia how she's doing, it's her we're all worried about now. Her and the... sparkling."

"Ah."

"I thought you'd come and kick my aft until it bled energon then drag me back in there. Guess I was wrong," Ironhide continued, tapping a finger noisily on his leg armour.

"No need for me to do that, I know who is on the way to do the threatening," Optimus said in a conversational tone, "I don't have to do everything myself. Delegation is something I think you should learn, 'Hide."

Ironhide gave his friend a sharp look, then twisted his head around at the sound of two revving and angry motorcycle engines. The other Arcee femmes; the purple and pink one; glided up to stop in front of them and transformed. The looks on the faces of the femmes were not pretty. They were pissed. The Weapons Specialist shrank in on himself. Primus. The other sisters. He prepared himself for being shot at, yelled at, abused, have missiles aimed at his aft, and his disassembled parts strewn in all directions, with his interface kept as a datapad pointer.

Surprisingly, the pink Arcee femme took one stride forward to stand in front of him, lifted her hand – which wasn't holding a rifle or transformed into a cannon – bathed him from head to foot in a blue strobe light, nodded to herself, stepped back... and quietly left with her sister to pass through the medbay doors. No words, no threats, no deactivation. No dead Ironhide.

"What in Primus' name was all that about?!" Ironhide finally burst out after a moment of bemused silence.

Optimus chuckled, "You really don't know? She measured you up to see what kind of burial chamber she could fit you into when she finally tears you to bits. Silent but deadly, that's my femmes."

"Slag..." Ironhide said with awe, his mouthplates open and his optic shutters clicking together.

"Indeed," Prime agreed with a haughty smirk. It was great to be the one with all of the advantages over the females. He honestly didn't know how other species coped without such an agreement.

"Why didn't they measure you up? You're at fault here too, we've both been on a berth with 'Mia. You could end up squashed in a ceremonial casket as much as I could!"

Optimus grimaced, trying to think of a way of saying what Ironhide needed to hear without crushing him completely, "Despite you being a handsome, strong, and legendary warrior in your own right, I believe they approve of me as a sire for their sparkling more than they approve of you, if that makes sense." When Ironhide only responded with a soft grumble, he laid a hand on the black mechs forearm in a vice-like grip, saying softly, "We need to talk..."

_**In the medbay...**_

Ratchet lifted his head and released his grip on Chromia when the light footsteps of the other femmes alerted him to their arrival. Chromia was calming down and getting some of her composure back. She was still sitting on the bench with her cannon arm cradled in her lap. Quiet and still.

"Sister!"

Chromia smiled, brightening up, "Hey guys." When they wordlessly encompassed her in a tight hug, all of them opening their end of the sister link they shared, Chromia laughed softly, "I guess we're going to have a sparkling, huh?"

Pink Arcee pulled back to lay her hand lovingly on Chromia's cheek, "You don't know which mech sired it?"

"No, I truly don't," Chromia shook her head, her angular and narrow face thoughtful, "even Ratchet says the interfacing was done too close together with each of them to tell."

"That's okay, we'll just blame both of them," Pink Arcee said seriously.

Ratchet leaned his aft back on the wall bench with his hands behind him, watching them with dimmed optics. Things had been happening so fast, he hadn't had much of a chance to think about this. One of Prime's femmes was carrying – 'pregnant', to use the Earth term. The one thing they all really needed to know was who the sire was, and since Optimus and Ironhide – the opportunistic fraggers – had both been with Chromia within days of each other, there was no certainty about which mech was responsible. That would have to wait until the sparkling was at least six Earth months old and its identity signature had evolved clearly enough from Chromia's own for anyone to tell. Then he could match the young one to Optimus or Ironhide as the 'daddy'.

The medic groaned loudly and covered his face with one hand. Maybe he could put in for some overdue long service leave? Siberia was nice this time of year, wasn't it? Especially if he could find a big sled for himself and have it pulled by Yaks when his hydraulics froze over. Now that was a nice thought.

When he thought of how he was going to tell the romantically-challenged Major Lennox about the Autobots little 'Oops' moment with a sparking femme, Siberia sounded absolutely wonderful. He wondered if stealing a spare C-17 would make him unpopular with General Morshower. Possibly.

Ratchet's attention was brought back to his surroundings when the medbay doors opened again – this time to admit a very passive looking Optimus Prime, without Ironhide.

"Femmes," Optimus Prime's gleaming red and blue body halted in front of the little threesome of females and he nodded politely at them, his hands relaxed and open by his side, "does Ironhide have permission to stay functioning for the moment and speak with you? He's waiting outside."

Chromia scowled, "If I feel like speaking to him I'll use my cannon on his crotch. Let him interpret _that_."

Listening in outside the medbay via Prime's comline (where it was easier to duck for cover), Ironhide winced and surreptitiously covered his groin with one black hand. ::_I'm leaving, she's going to shoot my interface off!_::

::_You will not, stay where you are_.:: Optimus sent back, his optics flashing. ::_If you think this conversation is going to be hard, wait until we have to explain all this to Major Lennox. THAT will be bad, considering his poor tolerance of our intimate relationships._::

::_Humph._::

Prime smiled wryly, staring up to the ceiling, ::_Give me a few moments, 'Hide, I wish to talk to Chromia._::

A grunt. ::_Yeah, yeah_.::

Chromia stared at the Autobot Commander with suspicion when he carefully got down one one knee in front of her so his head was at the same height as hers, placing his large hands together upon his knee armour and composing himself. The other two femmes flanked her, wondering what was going on. Prime kept his gaze down at his feet momentarily, then lifted his head to look Chromia in the optics. The blue femme cocked her head at him curiously. Ratchet watched on silently.

"Chromia," Optimus' voice had gone deep and formal, "I wish to congratulate you on carrying a sparkling orb, and extend my deepest admiration and pleasure to you for so kindly putting up with the actions of the not-so-perfect mechs you are surrounded by – including myself."

The blue femme covered her mouthplates and muffled a happy chuckle, her optics burning brightly at him. Pink Arcee patted her on the shoulder.

"I know and understand full well that none of us can be sure of who the sire of your precious little one is, it may be myself or it may be Ironhide, but regardless, I want you to know that you and the little one will be happily loved, protected and cared for by me; indeed; by ALL of us. You will not be doing this on your own. My desire to have an Autobot sparkling and my love for you eclipses the fact of which mech is the actual sire." Prime paused and offered his hand to Chromia, palm upwards, waiting for her response. When she slipped her hand into his, his long silver fingers closed over it. He smiled at her, "Would you be so gracious as to allow Ironhide and I to share the duty and honour of caring for both you and the little one for as long as you desire it?"

The brightness of Chromia's expression dimmed a little at the mention of Ironhide. The big black mech had some ground to make up to her if he wanted 'in' on the sparkling deal. She glanced sideways at her sisters. Pink Arcee nodded her agreement without hesitation, Purple Arcee was more reserved, only shrugging.

"Chromia?" Optimus prompted her softly.

Chromia swept her gaze over the gentle giant of a mech at her feet. Optimus was such a caring and kind mech. That he had so much power – physically, mentally, and because of his status as Supreme Commander – made those qualities even more amazing. He had the time and spark for anyone who needed him. Maybe it was time he got something back for himself. She wanted to make him happy. Maybe this sparkling would do it.

Optimus kept himself still when Chromia leaned forwards and stretched to place one hand on each of his wide shoulders. She pressed her mouthplates to his forehead softly.

"I accept you, Optimus, always did, always will," she smiled at him and nudged his broad noseplates with her petite ones while he sighed and dimmed his optics, the size difference between their heads almost comical, "and as for Ironhide..." she vented a sigh and sat back, "right now I can forgive, but learning to forget will take longer." With an impish smile she lovingly reached out and rubbed the concave curve of his noseplates with her index finger, "Tell him to come inside and we can start again."

Prime's optics surged to full power and he grinned at her, losing his regal composure. "Thank you." ::_Did you hear all that_?::

::_Yeah, I heard, I'm comin' in. And I have new protection._::

Optimus got to his feet and opened his arms with a smile as the two other Arcee femmes came towards him for a hug. He gladly gave them his attention and hugged them tightly to his chest, murmuring his congratulations. After all, Chromia may have been the one physically carrying the orb in her chest, but by definition all of the sisters were going to feel it, and they would need the same love and attention as Chromia did.

Ratchet snorted loudly, causing the mech and femmes to look up, "Oh look, heres the comic relief."

Ironhide was coming slowly in through the medbay entrance with cautious baby steps – and he was holding a pissed-off looking Major Lennox in front of him, directly in the line-of-fire for his groin plates. Like slag Ironhide was going to take the risk of Chromia shooting him in the interface if he annoyed her again.

"Ironhide, moron! Put me the _hell_ down," Will smacked his hands on Ironhide's wrist armor and strained to get free. "Don't you dare get me involved in your love problems, I'm a soldier not a freaking sex therapist!"

Chromia's mouthplates dropped open. She didn't know whether to laugh or scream. "Ironhide, you think holding Lennox there will stop me from shooting at you?!"

"Well, yeah. It will, won't it?" The Weapons Specialist said uncertainly, halting a few strides away from her with an unamused and cranky Will held out in front of him. If she was going to shoot him regardless of Will being in the way, he was going to drop the human and run.

The blue femme declined to answer and groaned and covered her face with her hands.

Optimus Prime kept one arm each around the other two femmes, allowing them to lean on his hips, murmuring, "Patience Chromia, patience."

"You know what? If this sparkling-" Chromia pointed to her chest, "-inherits a processor anything like yours, I'm going to retire from this army and go live on another planet, somewhere that I can have emotional breakdowns in peace!"

"Really? You know I like travelling, I don't mind moving to another planet for you," Ironhide said confidently, completely missing her point.

"Ugh," Optimus rubbed at his optics, praying to Primus that this sparkling turned out to be his and not Ironhide-the-idiot's.

Listening in, Will Lennox mimed Chromia's actions and words, pointing at his own chest and muttering to himself exactly what she had said. Sparkling. Processor. Ironhide. Yours. Wait – _IRONHIDE_?!

"SPARKLING?!" Lennox yelled, his voice breaking in the middle phonic. Then his head almost spun on his shoulders as he stared with horror up at his best Autobot friend. "You... y-you.... s-s-she.... _sparkling_?!"

"You know, no one mentioned days like this when I was given the 'Prime' title," Optimus said conversationally.

Ironhide stopped holding Lennox close to his body and held the man at arms length from him, "Uh... yeah. Surprise. And before you start yelling at me, we don't know if I'm the sire or Optimus is, so it's not ALL my fault."

Optimus Prime groaned dramatically and began smacking himself in the head at the same time as Ratchet began giggling like a maniac. This was bad. Very bad. Why had Primus given Ironhide a mouth and a CPU at the same time? Surely it would've been a better idea to leave him speechless and give him some pictures on boards to hold up when he wanted to express something?

"What... what...." Lennox gaped, then he shook himself. Get it together, Will, arrange the facts as clear as day, then pass judgement. He pointed at Chromia with one shaking finger. "You're pregnant?"

Chromia gave Ratchet a confused look, not knowing what the term was. Ratchet stopped snickering long enough to translate. "Carrying, Mia. He means carrying."

"Oh yes, I am," she confirmed, smiling.

"Uh huh." Will blinked rapidly a few times. "Congratulations." Sweat patches were beginning to show on the chest of his camouflage shirt. "Tell me this, and I'm going to say this the best and nicest way I can – WHO IS THE FREAKING FATHER?!" He slapped one hand on Ironhide's wrist again, "This tin can or whoever else Ironhide blabbered about?!"

"Tin can..." Ironhide rumbled dangerously. One squeeze of his fingers... Lennox sushi.

Optimus removed one long armored arm from a femme and lifted it up into the air, indicating himself. "That would be me or Ironhide, Major. Since we have both been intimate with Chromia recently, we won't be able to determine who has sired her sparkling until it is at least six Earth months old and starts to process its own unique code by using a starting sequence given to it from me or Ironhide. Then Ratchet will be able to solve the mystery."

Will was speechless. Almost.

"AAAARRRGGGHHHHH~!"

Ironhide cursed, resorting to holding the wailing human with only one hand while he shook the other one. "Why is my hand wet? Did you just leak on me?!"


	17. Chapter 17

**Male Is As Male Does**

**Authors Note: **Again, a big thank you to everyone who left reviews for the last chapter. _Shizuka Taiyou_, _JuJill_, _steelcrash_ (who got my fangirl instincts revving like crazy when she wrote about a naked, wet, Ultra Magnus), _fantasyaddict101_ (I'm sorry I don't talk more often! I've so crazily busy here), _Black Oracle_ (loves ya, I will catch up to my reviews on your fics too), _Elita One_, _manic the hedeghog_, _Jovianokamigirl_, _flamingmarsh_ (always there! LOL), _Borath (_words of dry wisdom), _I Caught Myself_, _Anasazi Darkmoon_, _Dragonball-Gal_, and _cmo-hatchet_ (amazing at writing smexy mechs and keeping me up laughing). Yes, here I go with another chapter. Hope it's okay. Enjoy!

**Chapter 17**

"I can't believe it!"

"Believe it."

"They don't even know who the father is!"

"Mmm."

"I mean, how can you not know, that's just stupid! Irresponsible! No one told us they needed educating about safe sex!"

"Safe sex, uh... Yes, it does sound like they need some lessons, or a pamphlet or something," Epps said solemnly, keeping his hand on Lennox's shoulder from where he was sitting next to his friend. Providing support. And a voice of reason. The other man was slumped in his chair. Unsettled. A little twitchy. Epps reasoned that it wasn't just _this_ that had pushed Lennox close to the edge, it was combination of many things that had been happening involving Prime and the femmes.

"What the heck are they, teenagers?!" Major Lennox kept going, his hands gesturing wildly in front of him. The front of his uniform was sticky and soggy. He was sweating buckets. "What are they going to do next, smoke pot in a private spot behind one of the hangars?! Get stuck into the local weed?!"

"I don't think so..." Epps murmured. If the Transformers had a God, he or she would no doubt be laughing at all this, and using divine intervention to have Skids or Mudflap come strolling past right at this moment with a joint between their fingers, murmuring, 'Wow, this is da _goood_ shit, ma man.'

"We have to tell the General." Will put his hands to his face. "How in God's name we're going to do this I don't know. Maybe the direct approach. Yeah. Yeah, that'd work! Why am I trying to cover up for them anyway? Let them handle their own mess! Hey Morshower, we have a pregnant teenage robot here, and I'm sorry I can't tell you who did it, because Optimus and Ironhide were doing her AT THE SAME TIME!" The last of Will's words came out in a screech and his forehead dropped with a harsh thunk onto the tabletop. Epps winced and rubbed Will's back.

"Now Will, my man, you need to calm down." He petted his friend on the back of the head, scrubbing up his hair. "What happened to the Will that didn't blink an eye when big robots from outer space showed up in front of his nose, eh? And didn't twitch in Egypt when the whole freakin' planet was at stake, yeah? Where's that Will gone to?"

"...back to his childhood happy place..." Will mumbled brokenly, not lifting his head.

"Man, y'know, I'd tell ya to get over this insecure sexuality thing you've got going on, you being a prude an all, but I think it's far too late to begin that shit."

Lennox shakily lifted one rude finger at him and waved it around.

"Don't do that to me, you know where I'll stick it," Epps warned, "it'll come back smelly."

The sound of rattling hinges and squeaking bearings interrupted them. Opening the hangar door, Ratchet poked his head in, "Lennox, how are you doing?"

Epps smiled broadly, his glaringly white teeth flashing. "He's alright. No need for a calming jab in the arse with some meds just yet."

When Major Lennox had turned into a gasping, partially-sobbing, feeble fleshbag of a human in Ratchet's medbay with his hands covering his eyes after being told about the 'situation', Optimus had called Epps phone and asked the man to come immediately. Epps had sat on the floor with Will while Optimus and Ratchet explained what was going on. Chromia was indeed 'pregnant', and no, they didn't know who the culprit was since Optimus and Ironhide had both been with her so close together. Yes, Chromia was going to 'give birth' eventually, yes, there was going to be a baby Transformer. Deal with it.

Ironhide had crouched on the ground next to his human best friend and stroked one thick black finger down his back occasionally. Epps had accepted what he was being told without much drama at all. He merely nodded slowly and answered with a series of 'uh huh', 'okay', 'man, that's kinda out there, you know?' while his expression stayed pretty neutral.

"Ah." Ratchet paused, his noseplates in the air as he surveyed the two men sitting at the table. He had been prepared to use a dart gun to tranq Lennox in the aft if needed. He was used to twitchy patients trying to run away. His aim with a needle or tranq dart was legendary. "Would I be permitted to put forward a few explanations for what is happening? I have cleared it with Optimus."

Epps shrugged. "Sure." He glanced at Will. No response.

"Good." Ratchet's heavy rolling footsteps caused Will to lift his head warily. The mech settled himself in a braced wide-legged stance in front of them, his hands clasped behind his back. Just as Ratchet opened his mouthplates to begin, another mech visitor made his entrance.

"May I enter?" This time it was Prime sticking his head in.

Epps wanted to laugh at the sight of the huge alien male who was more powerful than just about any other being in the universe politely requesting to come in. "I guess so." He patted Will. "It's not like this guy is gonna say anything." A growl from Will made him laugh.

"Alright! Alright." Lennox sat up and held his hands out. "I can deal with this. Just let it sink in." The man blinked, going motionless, his eyes staring up at the ceiling like he was waiting for Godly intervention. Then his head hit the table again. "Oh shit, no I can't..."

Ratchet smirked and shared a knowing look with his Leader, "Sounds like Magnus, doesn't he?"

Optimus halted next to his CMO, giving him a mild glare, "Ratchet..."

"Sounds like who?" Epps asked, having abandoned patting Will on the shoulder. There was only so much man-touching-man stuff he would do. He'd hit his limit. If Lennox needed more comforting he could go and sit in Ironhide's lap and suck his thumb.

Optimus sighed, rotating one shoulder as he did so (he reminded himself he had to make time to let Ratchet machine the cog), "My brother. Ultra Magnus."

"Another one?" Will said, looking bewildered. "Does your species have litters or something?"

Epps nodded, "Is this one an evil fucker too? Like ol' Megs?"

"No, he is not," Optimus Prime rumbled, chuckling, "he is an Autobot and my Field Commander. Unfortunately he has a reputation of saying 'I can't deal with that now' when he gets into impossible situations." His wide and impossibly strong shoulders appeared to sag an inch or two. "I had hoped he would be landing on Earth after I sent my original message," he sighed, "but no."

"Aww, hey, I'm sure he'll turn up. If he's anything like you I'm sure he's achin' to come and kick ass," Epps said consolingly.

"He is very much like me," Prime said, his optics turning azure with fondness, "just taller, wider, and more strict."

"Who also had his sense of humor removed via his aft..." Ratchet muttered.

"Sounds like we could use this guy," Epps nodded, ignoring the medic. "Our recent arrivals have been small fry compared to the heavy weights the 'Cons have taken delivery of, you know? No offence to you guys or us, but I'm amazed we won Egypt against the size and mass of what the 'Cons had to fight us with." He motioned with his hands, "That 'Devastator' thing? The huge one? He should've been able to wipe his nose with us and chuck us down the toilet all by himself."

While Prime and Epps talked family, Will lifted his head to go eyeball-to-optic with a crouching 'hmming' Ratchet. He had felt the tingle of a med scan on his flesh. "Don't you touch me," he warned the alien doctor, pointing his finger. "Hands off the human!"

Ratchet shook his head and rose to his feet. "Just checking... ahem, Prime? Epps? Can we please get to the point of why I'm here?"

Optimus bowed his head, "Apologies," and backed up to prop his hips against the Autobot-height bench along the wall behind him. Getting comfortable, he folded his thick arms over his sleek chestplates, crossed one ankle over the other in front of him and nodded, "Proceed."

The two men gave their attention to the tall medic. Not one for indulging in small talk or preliminaries, Ratchet got down to it.

"Since Ironhide and Optimus are not known for keeping their hands to themselves when it comes to the opposite gender-"

Prime opened his mouthplates to protest, thought better of it, and stayed silent with a roll of his optics and a quiet snort.

"-we have all found ourselves in this delightful-but-awkward situation. Chromia is carrying one sparkling orb. It is very difficult for our species to produce more than one orb at a time, and I honestly do wonder why Primus hasn't gone all-out and had her carrying twins or triplets, but be that as it may, there is a little one on the way that has been sired by _him_," Ratchet pointed at the regal mech behind him, "or the even bigger aft currently stinking up my medbay and comforting Chromia; Ironhide."

Will rigidly kept his attention on Ratchet. Epps had sunk his chin into one hand and was staring absent-mindedly at the medic. Lennox's eyes occasionally wandered over to Optimus and landed between his long legs on his crotch, but he shook himself and jerked his eyes front-and-centre just as quickly. Prime's enormous weapon-of-love hidden behind his groinplates, be damned. The big mech had performed a major misfire with his latest antics on Chromia. Major misfire. He argued mentally with himself that because Optimus Prime was – even by his human estimations – such an incredibly handsome and charismatic mech, it was to be expected that not all of his relations with females would be above board and cut-and-dried. There was bound to be a stuff-up somewhere. Heck, look at Tiger Woods.

"Unlike human physiology, I cannot take a sample from the developing orb to find out which of the fraggers is responsible. Nor will a scan reveal anything because at the moment the orb does not possess its own code. All I would see is a jumbled mess from Chromia's side of the merge. We will have to wait until the sparkling has been sparked and is at least six Earth months old." Ratchet smiled, getting into his groove, "At this point then we can start handing out blame and kicks in the aft," he smiled wryly, saying his party trick, "along with obligatory robot condoms."

Optimus started to laugh but smothered it quickly with a hand over his face. His armored chest shook with silent mirth. Epps spluttered and grinned, agreeing. Even Will cracked a smile.

"Be quiet, Prime, and stop giggling," Ratchet said automatically. "Right then. How did this all happen?" He glared at the Major when he took on a stricken appearance, "No Lennox, I am not going to go over again the erotic details of what a mech and femme do on the berth. Optimus and Ironhide have destroyed enough of your sanity, yes?"

Will nodded frantically, his head bouncing up and down. Epps groaned, splaying his arms out on the table and shaking his head at the ceiling.

"What I do want to say is a lot more serious. As I see it – and bear this at the front of your CPU or human mind – there are two equally good arguments for which of the mechs is the sire."

Will blinked owlishly. Epps lifted himself up off the table with a grumble to sit up straight, while Optimus pushed himself away from his bench and came to sit with them. The humans didn't twitch at several tons of alien mech dumping his aft onto the floor. With his aft on the ground, back to the wall, and knees drawn up in front of him with his hands in his lap, Optimus appeared very relaxed. The Commander knew that Ratchet's theories were just that – theories. Nothing would really be known about what was going on until the sparkling had matured enough for them to tell 'who done it'.

Ratchet's optics lightened as he began his explanations, enjoying himself, "As we all know, Optimus is a Prime." Epps stuck his tongue out. He hated people stating the obvious. "His body, his mechanisms, his entire being is ruled by a different set of protocols and parameters than that of any other normal mech. When he is joined intimately to another, his systems take complete control of whoever he is joined to. Add this to the fact that he is also now carrying the Matrix in his chest, and things get even more unusual."

Optimus was silent. He sat in his spot with his optics glowing steadily, a neutral expression on his faceplates.

Epps moved his iPod into his pocket on the leg furtherest away from Optimus Prime and nudged Lennox in the side, whispering, "Remind me to never plug my iPod into him again to recharge it. I don't want iPod babies or any other strange shit happening to it."

Ratchet huffed loudly, continuing on, "Combine all this with the fact that the Ancient Primes have voiced their opinion to Optimus personally that he does need to reproduce and you start to see that it makes no difference if Chromia's reproduction programs are on, off or non-existent. Prime's system over-rides hers."

Prime spread his knees apart fractionally and glanced surreptitiously down at his own crotch, lifting one optic ridge. He honestly had believed that _he_ controlled _it_, not the other way around. Maybe he'd been wrong about that.

"So Optimus is a walking, talking sex machine ready to knock up any female he looks at whether he wants to or not," Will said tiredly. "Great."

"Man, we need to fly a veterinarian in here or somethin'," Epps said loudly, pointing sideways at where Optimus was sitting, "he needs to be neutered."

While Ratchet chuckled and nodded in agreement, Prime reached out around Lennox's chair – and flicked his finger lightly at the legs of Epps' chair. Epps yelled and hung on to his seat as he slid sideways and rocked violently. He stayed on and dragged himself indignantly back to the table, giving Prime a filthy look.

"You wanna take this outside, homeboy, do you?!" Epps threatened back, puffing himself up. Will just sighed and rubbed at his eyes. Optimus smirked and returned his attention to Ratchet.

"Ah, but then there is Ironhide to consider," Ratchet said gleefully, warming up to his subject. "Him I have actual readings for. His spark signature is a perfect match for that of Chromias." He activated his arm holo emitter and showed a real-life crackling sphere overlaid with another different colour sphere. The pair matched up seamlessly and formed a throbbing ball of fire. "See? I've never seen a pair of Cybertronians more suited to one another, and I've seen a lot of sparks. This factor alone would pre-dispose Chromia to spontaneously off-shoot an orb from her merging with him. Pregnant, as you call it. Especially if she is feeling a very strong attraction to him, which she has admitted to. Optimus being with her first and interfering with her programs so they were active and ready to fire would make it possible for Ironhide to get her with spark as well." He shut the holo down and folded his arms over his chest. "So now you see. There's an equal chance that 'Hide or Optimus is the sire."

"Uh huh," Epps drawled. Looking stumped. "Well, I do know one thing. No more femmes for either of them. Zip. None. Nada. Nope. What do you say, Ratchet?"

Optimus lifted a finger to protest but it was too late.

"Most certainly," the medic said coolly, "they will have to self-overload from now on until I can work something out. We cannot risk any more surprises until I find a foolproof way to stop this from happening every time one of them gets restless."

That was when Major Lennox broke into chuckles and began banging his fist on the table, looking much happier than he had been. "HA! No more antics, no more messes, no more tripping over humping Autobots." The man grinned with glee. He looked so feral even Epps leaned back away from him. Will pointed happily at a disturbed-looking Optimus Prime, "Suck it up dude, no more femmes for you!"

Prime growled unhappily to himself then sighed, shaking his head. "I have to agree with all of you. I can see no other choice. A sparkling is a happy and very welcome event, but they should not appear unexpectedly and at random." A slow smile covered his face, and he leaned over Will, his immense mass shadowing the small human, "But I will leave it to you, Major Lennox, to inform Ironhide of this latest development. If you think my libido is uncontrollable, you have no idea what levels that mech can attain. He will be very unhappy, to say the least. "

The color drained from Will's face. No more happy time for Ironhide. Oh shit. He'd better be sitting inside a tank surrounded by the other Autobots for protection when those words left his mouth.


	18. Chapter 18

**Male Is As Male Does**

**Authors Note: **I've noticed other authors mentioning and saying thanks to their reviewers in their authors note, and since I can't keep up with replying to all you generous peoples, that's what I'll do too! LOL Thank you to these reviewers for leaving comments on chapter 17 -_Falling Right Side Up, Anasazi Darkmoon, Dragonball-Gal, TFSTARFIRE, __Black Oracle, Miss CHSparkles, Plenoptic, fantasyaddict101, steelcrash, BoredTech, dglsprincess105, Jovianokamigirl, GrimlockX4, Elita One, _and_ Jacqueline Faber. _

OH! And to all you adults out there (only over 18, please, as it is a mature fic) I'd love it if you can drop by and read the fic '**Elita's Wish'**by _ElitasLove_. It really is BRILLIANT, and I love it to bits. If you're an Optimus and Elita fan, you'll be grabbing it with both hands and never letting go. Trust me.

**Chapter 18**

_**Operations hangar, NEST, Diego Garcia, early morning....**_

Optimus Prime stood patiently. He was fond of General Morshower. The man could be rough with his orders, he was literal and didn't mind interjecting slang and informal words into his on-duty conversations, but he was a good and caring Leader. If something was utter shit, he said so. If something was brilliant, he said that too, in his dry humorous way. Like himself, the General was intensely interested in the welfare and morale of his soldiers. He was a commander who refused to toe the line when it came down to choosing between kissing higher level aft to make himself look good or doing something that benefited those under his command. His men always came first, his own aft be damned. He was in the army for the protection of America and being on the side of the good guys. Government bullshit didn't rate on his radar.

"So..." Morshower leaned his hands on the railing, slinging his thick but proud physique between his arms and eyeballing the huge mech. "Am I correct in saying that there will shortly be a baby Autobot loose on base?"

Optimus and Morshower were alone in the cavernous building. Prime had volunteered to inform the General of the situation with Chromia, including the mortifying titbit that it was unknown which mech – himself or Ironhide – was the doer of the deed, in exchange for Major Lennox being the one to inform Ironhide that he was now under strict orders to keep his interface and spark to himself. The man hadn't flinched at finding out that two males were teaming up with one female. Optimus had helpfully pointed out in a roundabout way that it was NOT at the same time. Different nights. Optimus guessed that while humans had short life spans, the intelligent older ones like Morshower had seen many things – believable and unbelievable - in their lives too.

In order for Morshower to fully understand what was going on, it had been essential to inform the human man about Cybertronian anatomy and physiology as well. A few more eyelid blinks than were strictly necessary had been the only outward sign that Morshower was in any way shocked.

The Autobot Commander nodded politely, "Yes. Chromia has been removed from the duty roster, and depending on how healthy and well-behaved the sparkling is, she may not be re-instated for many Earth months."

"Hmmm. I can understand that. My grandson gives my daughter one hell of a time, and he's only two years old."

Optimus was watching the General cautiously for signs of CPU overload. He'd been calm and clinical about being informed that the aliens on his base had intimate relations just like humans did, using much the same anatomical equipment and such relations between Prime, Ironhide, and Chromia had resulted in a teeny complication. An alien baby.

"Well. If you agree, I'd like to keep this quiet and just between us for the time being. Meaning, those of us who already know and can be trusted." Morshower straightened his shirt across his chest. "I don't see the point in getting the Government heavies into an uproar, and yet more men like our much loved Galloway-"

Optimus openly chuckled at that.

"-being sent our way to stick their thorny noses into things that don't involve them." Morshower was giving him a look from under his downward slanting eyebrows that meant, 'of course you agree with me, don't you?'.

"Agreed. Neither myself nor my team look forward to yet more rules and invasive scrutinisation that has nothing to do with protecting Earth and her inhabitants." Optimus was focused on Morshower, but he was also aware of a situation developing outside on the tarmac involving Major Lennox breathing far too hard and letting loose many vulgar expletives. Unfortunately, the General was soon to be made aware of such a situation also.

Ironhide let forth a roar of anger that caused every loose item in the hangar to rattle alarmingly.

General Morshower's eyes widened. He knew who that was. The big scary black bot with the weapons fetish that was prone to making his own decisions about the way orders were carried out. When Optimus shook his head slightly, the man relaxed. He had learnt to trust Prime's judgement. The tall alien was many thousands of years older than he was, and his ability to command and lead his army was on the same level as that of a heavenly being.

"LENNOX!"

Optimus refused to glance over his shoulder, but via his multiple sensors he was aware of Will running for his life at top speed past the Operations hangar door, the man's thick combat boots flashing through the air at a speed Optimus was sure they hadn't been designed for. He slowly folded his thick arms over his wide chest and vented air through his outtakes. His optics tracked the interested eyes of Morshower, who had a much better vantage point than he did since Prime had his back to the action. The General's gaze went from left to right, following his favourite soldier. Then his eyes zipped back to the beginning and veered at a faster speed to watch Ironhide thunder past on two legs after his prey. Everything in the building rattled and shook from the black mechs heavy steps.

"Will he..." Morshower asked hesitantly.

"Kill him? No." Prime frowned, casually shifting his weight on hips from one side to the other so his armor glinted under the ceiling lights, "I think..."

An armored Jeep with a machine gun on top raced past, a determined Sergeant Epps at the wheel. Black man with the muscle and getaway car to the rescue. Optimus smiled. A retrieval mission was underway. A small explosion and a human scream made him immediately open a comlink to Ratchet. He knew straight away that Lennox wasn't injured or dead because he was recording his vital signs remotely, as he did with every human he was involved in missions with.

::_Are you monitoring this?::_

Ratchet came straight back. _::What else is there to do for entertainment on this island from the pit? Of course I am. I have also broken open a new packet of band-aids in anticipation of what Sam refers to as 'boo-boos'..::_

Prime smiled, _::Good decision.::_

Morshower was about to say something when his attention was taken away yet again by the Jeep Epps had commandeered careering past the hangar with Lennox in the passenger seat pounding his fist on the dashboard and yelling, "GOGOGO~!"

Epps had his foot jammed to the floor on the accelerator and he wasn't stopping for nobody, shouting, "Man, I'm goin'! I'M GOIN'! But this ain't a Ferrari!"

Optimus admired the way Ironhide threw himself into the air mid-stride and transformed so quickly in a blur of parts that his wheels hit the ground and bore him away with a roar of his massive engine before Morshower could exclaim, "What the hell is going on?!"

"Do you want the long and dirty version or the short legal version?" Optimus quipped, untangling his arms and rolling his wide shoulders.

"Uh... I, uh... oh heck with it, give me all the gory details. It can't be any worse than hearing that you have a manhood the size of my motorbike," the General answered, a slow and sneaky grin spreading over his craggy face.

Prime lifted an optic ridge, smirking, pleased that they were getting along so well, "Indeed. Shall we size up this 'motorbike' and see who is the bigger mech?"

Morshower guffawed at the same time as Ratchet came pounding at a moderate jog past the hangar door, following all the commotion and calling, "Don't forget the band-aids, Ironhide! They help stop arterial bleeders from severed limbs!"

The throaty roar of a muscle car engine and the scream of slick racing wheels over the top of the chaos Ironhide was causing made Optimus pause and look thoughtful. He took two long strides to the open building doors, leaned on the door frame and peeked outside. He nodded to himself. He stepped back just as the bright yellow form of his scout Bumblebee came running inside past his sticky-beaking Commander. In each hand he held one of his human charges, Mikaela and Sam. Both of them appeared shocked and confused. Bumblebee slid to a stop on his two wide feet and spun around in a crouch behind Optimus Prime, carefully dumping his humans behind Prime's very long legs while he transformed his arm cannon and activated all of his defence systems. Sam stood looking bewildered where he'd been planted by Bee and Mikaela just sighed and started to inspect her nails.

Prime vented air and muttered to himself. He propped one hand on his hip while he rapped Bumblebee on the head with his fist. "Bumblebee."

The crouching Camaro irritatedly swatted away Prime's hand, let forth an annoyed chirp, and kept his attention on the craziness outside being caused by a rampaging Ironhide. More small explosions that sounded like firecrackers echoed around the base. More high-pitched human screams came forth.

"Bumblebee!" Prime reached down and gripped Bee by the edge of his armor behind his neck, lifting the smaller mech up onto the tips of his pointed feet. Morshower's eyes widened at the display of casual strength by the big robot. Bumblebee squealed in surprise and swung back and forth in Prime's powerful grip with wide optics. "Bumblebee, what on Cybertron are you doing?!"

"That's what I'd like to know!" Sam spoke, waving his arms, "Why is Ironhide acting like a nutcase and trying to run over Lennox and Epps?!"

Optimus blinked down at the boy, "Just one microsecond Sam." He glanced over at Morshower, "General? Please excuse me if I talk to Bumblebee for a moment in our native language, it will make things faster and easier."

Morshower waved a hand, not bothered, "Sure."

Optimus dropped Bumblebee to his feet and immediately began emitting an ear-splitting monologue of shrills, clicks and whistles. Bumblebee's optic ridges went further and further up his forehead as Optimus went on. In the silence after Prime had ceased his speech Bumblebee stayed stock still – then he began shaking. Laughter in both recorded audio form and Cybertronian clicks poured forth from him. He leaned forwards onto Optimus Prime's immense bulk and trembled with mirth.

Optimus made a show of rolling his optics in their casings while Bee was pressed against his lower chest and laughing his head off, and reverted to English, "Yes, I did have one tiny hope that Ironhide would react the same way but as we already know-" Prime's sentence was interrupted by more bangs and roars from a very upset Ironhide, "-he has once again taken the offensive option and is hoping to fix things with explosions and death threats."

A very loud shriek that sounded like a woman - but Optimus knew to be Major Lennox - had Morshower, Sam, and Mikaela looking horrified.

The Autobot Commander relaxed, "Do not worry, Ironhide is all noise and blunder when it comes to his friends. He may be angry but he will not hurt anyone."

A VERY loud explosion and a roar from Ironhide had all the occupants of the hangar staring at Optimus like he was insane.

For the next few minutes, Ironhide, Epps and Lennox played a laughable but deadly version of 'dodgem derby' around the base, weaving, ducking and racing their way around like they were competing in some kind of a deformed alien Grand Prix. Another human shout (Optimus easily identified it as Sergeant Epps) with a much more inhuman scream (Lennox, Prime thought wryly) was accompanied by the screech of metal being abused. Ah. Ironhide had caught his little friends. Optimus glanced back at the General. The human Commander was staring out the door and leaning sideways over the platform railing with a stunned 'WTF' expression on his face.

"He... he... Ironhide just tore the roof off my Jeep!" Morshower said in disbelief. He pointed an accusing finger at Optimus Prime, saying firmly, "THAT is coming out of your account, those things are expensive."

Prime sighed, looking down at the floor and shaking his head sorrowfully, "I thought as much." He'd have to back out of all those auctions on eBay he was bidding on. Slag it. He needed a pay rise. The American military didn't pay that well.

Ironhide's heavy footsteps rattled the metal fabrication that made up the hangars walls. He came stomping into the operations room with Major Lennox held by his ankles swinging in front of him. Epps was jogging along at his heels and trying to negotiate the safe return of his best friend. Optimus turned himself sideways to keep a carrful optic on everyone in the hangar.

"Did you authorise _this_," Ironhide gave Lennox a mild shake; Will yelled and flailed; "to tell me to keep my hands off my Mia?"

"Someone had to tell you to!" Lennox yelled, pointing at Ironhide with a pissed expression. His violently red face was detracting from his attempt to appear intimidating, as was his shirt hanging half over his head where it had come out of his pants. "And put me down, you freaking idiot! You can't do this to me!" Will struggled to pull himself upright by grabbing bits of Ironhide's wrist.

Morshower peered closely at Will's underwear where they had been exposed by his shirt. "Lennox, what kind of salary are you on to be able to afford Calvin Klein boxers?"

Ironhide ignored the human NEST Commander and growled, glaring at Will, "Quiet, rodent. Optimus? Answer me!"

"I did indeed authorise Major Lennox to tell you that interfacing or spark merging with Chromia was forbidden. Now please put down Lennox," Optimus moved his own head partially upside down so he could get a better look at Will, the man looked like his head was going to burst, "or at least hold him the right way up." Prime straightened himself, "And if it makes you feel any less hostile, I have applied the same order to myself. The femmes are off-limits to any of us until Ratchet has some way of guaranteeing that no more sparkling surprises will be the result of our intimate relations with them."

Sam made a choked noise while Mikaela snickered. The girl had already been briefed by Ratchet on the orders that were to be given to Ironhide. She knew what was going on. Bumblebee giggled madly - Ironhide made a memo with himself to get revenge on the little bot later.

Ironhide's expression changed from 'I'm-gonna-kill-you', to 'Oh, really?'. He smirked. "Is that right? No femme gropage for you either?" With one abrupt movement he cupped his free hand under Will, uprighted him, and dumped him on his shoulder. Lennox steadied himself and looked as if he didn't think this new position was any better. He hung onto Ironhide's protruding head armor and blinked a lot while waiting for his vision and head to return to normal. His balance was totally shot after being dangled upside down for far longer than was necessary. Now he was Ironhide's parrot instead of a chew toy. Great. The Weapons Specialist crossed his arms and glared at Optimus, "I'll believe that when I start hearing noises coming from your quarters at night and no femme is in there with you."

Epps covered his face with his hands, muttering, "Oh man, I did not want to know that..."

Optimus Prime flared his armor and flashed his optics at Ironhide, rumbling strongly, "If you think I'm going to give you any help or guidance in how to self-overload yourself you have another thing coming."

General Morshower straightened himself up with as much dignity as he could muster and began briskly climbing down from the gangway, "I believe this meeting is over. Way over."

Once order had been restored, Chromia herself came quietly rolling on her single wheel over to the operations hangar. She transformed her wheel into her two split legs and stopped by the door to observe Optimus. His broad back was to her and his attention was on an encrypted uplink to the American President. She took the time to position herself in a semi-concealed position in the shadow of the doorway and watch him without interference.

He really was such a regal and awe-inspiring male. He carried his power and authority so easily. Her optics rolled over the swell of his heavy armor covering his underlying protoform and his big body, taking note of his sheer maleness and the awesome strength that lay within him. His chest was so thick and broad, carrying the weight of his wide strong shoulders, yet it narrowed down beautifully into his trim and taut waist. His legs were the longest she'd seen on any mech. His thighs were enough to make any femme groan with desperation to get her hands on them. Even his hands were well-formed and just-right. She placed her hand over the middle of her chest and looked down at herself. If this sparkling had been sired by him, if this life she now carried within her reproductive chamber turned out to be his, she would be proud and honored to be the female responsible for half of it. She would. Even though deep within her spark she knew it was Ironhide that she wished to share her life with, she would be equally happy if her sparkling had been produced by Optimus.

She lifted her head and was surprised to see Prime cocking his head over his shoulder at her, his cheekplate and jaw highlighted by the ceiling lights. He smiled briefly at her, his optics brightening happily. She returned his smile with one of her own. With a quick flash of his optical sensors, he returned his attention to the President. Chromia transformed her legs into a single wheel once more and left to find Ironhide. He would be easier to talk to now that he'd gotten all the slag out of his system. Much easier.

_**Two Earth months later...**_

Optimus Prime relaxed his backplates against the wall above his berth, keeping one long leg stretched out in front of him to support the small mass of Chromia who was lying curled up across his lap with her head snuggled on his hip plate. He stared down at the strong-sparked female who was keeping him company. The femme that may or may not be carrying his sparkling. It was all so strange yet wondrous to him to think of a new life being carefully nurtured and coaxed along within Chromia's chest, the result of him or Ironhide sharing their life force with her. He liked to think that it wasn't only Chromia lying in his lap but a tiny new life as well. He had two life essences cuddling into his armor. By every Cybertronian standard that existed, the femme should not be bearing a sparkling from them. But she was. By all the rules, it shouldn't have happened. But that was in the past...

Chromia had been alternating her recharge nights between him and Ironhide for the past few weeks. It was an awkward situation. He had protested when she had declared that she would be spending equal time with him and Ironhide and there would be _no_ favouritism. It had been obvious to Optimus that Chromia's real love was all Ironhide's way. He didn't want Chromia feeling as if she had to continue to foster his attentions because she _might_ be carrying his sparkling and not Ironhide's. Chromia had replied loudly and firmly that she loved both of them equally, the only difference was the type of love, and would both he and Ironhide please shut up about who would be doing what. This was her decision, not theirs.

With Ironhide smirking at the kiss-my-aft attitude displayed by his warrior femme and Optimus looking embarrassed, Chromia had marched over to the bigger mech and used whatever hand hold on his body she could get to pull the tall Autobot Commander down to her height. Then she had soundly and intimately kissed the life out of him while he was bent over at nearly forty-five degrees. When she was finished she left Optimus standing with a dazed expression on his faceplates and did exactly the same with Ironhide – the only difference being that Ironhide had tried to get _more_ than just a kiss with his hands wandering her body and had ended up being walloped in the jaw for his trouble. Since Ironhide considered that to be foreplay, he wasn't offended.

Optimus had stoically accepted the no interfacing or merging rule enforced by Ratchet. Ironhide had been more grumpy and tetchy about it. Obviously. But the one morning when Optimus had caught Ironhide leaving his room after spending the night with Chromia, he'd seen the black mech with a broad and satisfied smirk on his faceplates – proof that Ironhide _could_ live for a short time without sheathing his interface within a females valve or splitting his chestplates to merge his spark with hers.

The Autobot Leader hadn't been so badly off either. On the nights when Chromia was absent from his recharge berth, he'd satisfied himself the way most males did when they were alone. And the nights when Chromia was visiting? Prime decided that femmes could be a lot more inventive with their hands and mouths than most mechs gave them credit for...

Chromia had been very accommodating of both of them during her period of sparkling carrying, sharing her experiences with them and making sure they were happy too. The day when both Optimus and Ironhide had returned from a brief overseas mission covered in mud, sludge, and Primus-knows-what other crap, rolling off the plane and transforming into their bipedal modes with organic bits dripping off their soiled bodies, they had both been more concerned about Chromia's welfare than cleaning themselves off and getting refuelled. The human soldiers had quietly grinned and nudged each other over the sight of the two big mechs holding Chromia between them – one imposing male either side of her petite form, Chromia with her feet off the ground - and reassuring her and themselves about each others health.

Optimus, Ironhide and Chromia were a strange threesome, but they made it work.

"Ugh... slag it..."

Prime's attention was drawn back to the present and femme lying in his lap. "Chromia?" His hand cradled the back of her head. "Everything alright?"

The femme paused for a moment, then grimaced, the growing pain in her chest making her curl her body up into a ball on Prime's waist and thighs. "Slag it," she hissed, pressing a hand to her chest and shaking. "I think this sparkling wants out."

Optimus felt his air intakes shudder to a halt in shock. "What... n-no, it's too early, it can't be. It _shouldn't_ be! Ratchet said-"

Chromia hissed, "And what do you know about spark-carrying, Prime? Tell that to the little one!" She grunted in pain and fought against her instincts that wanted her to open her chestplates and split her reproduction chamber to release her sparkling. It shouldn't be coming now. It couldn't come out. It couldn't! "Get me to Ratchet. _Now_, preferably," she demanded, and slapped her hand several times on his armored midsection for emphasis when Optimus was too overwhelmed to react, "Now, now, NOWWW!"


End file.
